Copyright or wrong?

Since 1789 when George Washington signed the first United States copyright law, copyright has clarified what we can and cannot do as professional educators in our classrooms, as well as in our everyday lives. Copyright laws have significantly reduced the amount of material that we can legally utilize in our classrooms. The rights of the copyright holder make it illegal for teachers to reproduce, adapt, distribute, and display copyrighted materials unless they are given permission to do so. If teachers use prohibited materials and are caught they will be charged and may face monetary, as well as other, consequences.

Before taking Utilization of Instructional Technology for Educators, at Auburn University, I thought it was perfectly acceptable to copy worksheets that I found online to use in my class, make copies of parts of a book for my students and hang artwork that I printed from the internet. I also saw no harm in showing my students a movie that I brought from home if my class had some down time or even show them a recording of a television show. I definitely would have, at one time or another, copied a page from a coloring book for my class seeing as I plan to teach kindergarten. All of these things, however, are prohibited under copyright laws unless the material says otherwise. Some other misconceptions are that schools can use any copyright protected materials they wish and using a material in your class “for the good of the kids” is okay.

I feel that the misconceptions I had are very common. For this reason, it is very important that all the teachers in any given school understand the law itself. It is important for teachers to fully understand copyright laws because, if caught, a cease and desist letter may not be the only consequence; schools can be sued for real or actual damages and can be fined. The attorney’s fees and court costs are also added to the damage.

In my opinion, work for hire is the part of copyright that teachers need to understand when taking a job. Work for hire states that any worksheets that a teacher creates while he/she works for a given school district is actually property of that given school district. But work for hire is not limited to worksheets; the part of the law states that, “just about anything a teacher does within the context of his or her job could be claimed as the intellectual property of the school.” Work for hire affects the majority of teachers who move from one school to another, because if a teacher changes districts they are technically supposed to ask for permission to continue using and adapt their class materials. It is hard to believe that anything that I put my time in effort into while teaching may not considered to be my property.

I think that it is very important that teachers make sure that their students know what is and is not acceptable under copyright laws. We can teach our students, first and foremost, by example. We, as educators, need to set an example for our students because we cannot break copyright laws and expect our students not to follow suit. Many children may not understand the serious consequences that can follow breaking certain copyright laws; statutory fines range from $750 to $30,000 per infringement.

Things that our students do everyday such as illegally downloading or burning and distributing copies of CDs and DVDs can potentially have major consequences. We should not, however, only make our students aware of the things they are not suppose to do but also the things that they can do. We should show our students that there are ways around breaking copyright laws. Our students need to know that public domain is a work that is not protected by copyright and that works published before 1923 are currently in public domain in the United States. They should also know that if a work was created in the United States after January 1, 1978 you know that the work was automatically protected by copyright at the moment it was “fixed” or written down, saved to disk, painted on a canvas, etc. In addition it is important for students to know what cannot be copyrighted such as facts and government documents. Most importantly, I want my students to know that their work is automatically copyrighted once it is “fixed.”

Copyright law is serious but many people do not fully understand it. We need to educate our educators as to what is acceptable and unacceptable to use in our classrooms. By the same token, we also need to educate our students and teach by example.