Students are often warned about what they put out online, but the Social Media Marketing class is taking a look at the possible legal ramifications with students tentatively scheduled to present their work on Wednesday.

“For the project students conduct research over an assigned court case involving social media and then assimilate that research into a presentation for their class,” teacher Courtney Benson said. “I want them to be able to analyze and have a better understanding of legal implications that surround social media.”

The class picked what case they wanted and were given information about the case. From there, students had to research more about what happened.

“My case is Jennifer Patterson v. Natalie Grant, basically, Jennifer Patterson filed a case against Grant for slander, defamation, libel and false light invasion of privacy,” senior Arnulfo Rubio said. “Ms. Patterson alleged that Grant made untrue statements and posted false and defamatory comments about her on Facebook and Twitter. Grant ended up winning the case because the judge said that the case fell under the First Amendment and her freedom of speech.”

After researching the case, students compiled all of their findings into a PowerPoint that is being presented to the class. 

“The project is more complex, and harder than I thought it would be,” freshman Jefferson Xin said. “But even after reading and hearing about these different cases I still don’t think of social media as a bad thing. Still, I think that the project was great and helpful.”

The project is designed to help students understand there can be legal ramifications when it comes to social media use.

“I think that this is something that students should know about since most high school students are active on social media,” Benson said. “It’s important that they are also familiar with the legal implications that could affect them.”