Confusion about copyright laws negatively impacts teachers' and students' classroom experiences, according to a report recently released by AU's Center for Social Media.
The study, "The Cost of Copyright Confusion for Media Literacy," was released Sept. 25. The report included 63 interviews with "educators, educational media producers and organizational leaders in media literacy," the report said. The term "media literacy" entails how someone builds on ideas from communication and literary theory to better understand the world in which he or she lives, according to the report.
In the past decade, there has been "a remarkable increase in copyright consciousness," causing teachers to make "dramatic changes in their practice," according to the study. The report discussed teachers' inability to use certain songs, films and videos in classrooms, even when it is for educational purposes. The inability to use such tools has risked "stifling the creative flow of cultural information," according to one teacher interviewed in the study.
Teachers often need to use certain forms of media, such as songs, articles or YouTube videos, to build media-literate students, according to the report.
Susan Glover, a government professor, said although her problems with using copyrighted material are not as burdensome as professors who use cultural images, she finds it difficult to create cheap course packets for her students.
"If I want to use part of a book, or if I want to use something from a journal to which AU does not have full access, the process of getting copyright approval can be inconvenient and annoying, to be honest," she said in an e-mail. "I can throw it to the reserves desk and have them get permission, but if the library does not have the book or journal, then I either have to find it myself and deliver it to them and then they need to get permission to copy it, or I have to find another source."
A "fair use" doctrine, which aims to balance owners' and users' rights to copyrighted material, is incorporated into the Copyright Act of 1976, according to the report.
However, teachers often overlook or misunderstand the concept of fair use, the report said. Educators "need to know about the full range of fair uses available to them and their students" as they are widely available, according to the study. Because teachers don't know how much is fair use, they end up not using anything at all, the study reported.
One AU student complained about the obstacles presented by copyright laws.
"I've had to use songs for presentations in class and realized that I can't because of laws that I find ridiculous," said Alyssa Charland, a sophomore in the School of International Service. "If I need to use a song in a presentation, then I'm going to use that song."
Tara Meehan, a sophomore in SIS, said she has not been academically affected by copyright issues.
"I've never really been held back from any learning," Meehan said.
The Washington College of Law's Program on Information Justice and Intellectual Property and Temple University's Media Education Lab were also involved in the report. A full copy of the investigation can be found on SOC's Center for Social Media's Web site, www.centerforsocialmedia.org.
