A nursing student lost a First Amendment case when the Eight U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled 2-1 that the nursing school could dismiss him from the program for posting threatening and offensive comments on Facebook. The court ruled that Craig Keefe violated professional standards with his comments and was not entitled to First Amendment protection for off-campus speech since the comments affected other nursing students on campus and demonstrated his lack of professionalism. (On Brief, October 26, 2016, by Ryan Leemkuil)
The dissenting judge wrote that since the speech was off-campus it was not school sponsored and that using such vague terms and “respect and compassion” as a basis for throttling speech was problematic in not allowing students sufficient notice of restrictions. (Constitutional Law Prof Blog, October 26, 2016, by Ruthann Robson)