COPYRIGHT, PIRACY, AND ETHICS

This activity takes a look at two situations that prospective teachers may encounter during the course of their jobs. Each situation is presented and then examined to see if the teacher is following the “Fair Use Guidelines” for educators under U.S. Copyright law. By no means are these the only situations that a teacher can encounter, but they do illustrate some of the issues involved that educators need to be aware of.

[Situation #1]

“A teacher in your school (who has a really rowdy bunch of monsters) makes an agreement with them that they learn how to make power point presentations on sports, war, hunting, rock music, and such. She lets them get graphics from anywhere on the Internet. Sites such as Sports Illustrated, ESPN, DOD, and the Rock Music Hall of Fame. They make great presentations and become great kids. What are the copyright implications?”

[Answer #1]

Instructing her students to use graphics from anywhere on the Internet is permitted…with some reservations stated under the U.S. Copyright Law’s Fair Use Guidelines. The students must be explicitly told that any graphics they obtain from websites must be used only for this educational project. Before they use the graphics, the students must make sure that any site they come across doesn’t state that written permission is needed to use the graphics for any purpose. Otherwise, the students should be told that they must use no more than five works from any one source; use not more than 10% or 15 images, whichever is less from any one site; use 10% or 3 minutes, whichever is less for any image that shows motion; and use 10% or 30 seconds, whichever is less for any piece of music used. Also, all graphics used must be given copyright within the student’s project. The student can only produce two copies for educational use as well. Unless the students are given these guidelines to follow, the students may be open to copyright infringement by adapting existing graphics leading to a derivative work that may hurt the value of the original graphics.

[Situation #2]

“Mr. Hamer is tutoring for the functional writing test out of a copyrighted series of workbooks from Houghton Mifflin. He has 27 students but only 20 books were purchased for his class. The same material is available at the HM web page. He prints enough pages for her kids each morning for today’s class.”

[Answer #2]

While at first glance, this teacher’s activity might not seem that bad, it does violate the Fair Use Guidelines. The reason his actions are illegal is because he seeks to make copies of “consumables” which are defined as being workbooks and standardized tests. Making copies of the workbooks is not allowed under law. Mr. Hamer must simply order more workbooks or have his 27 students share the available workbooks till 7 more can be obtained.