A parent and president of a local family values organization says Highland's Lone Peak High School broke the law when the school newspaper published articles dealing with sex.

Stephen Graham, president of the Standard of Liberty Foundation, has asked the State Office of Education and the state Attorney General's Office to look into three articles that have appeared in The Lone Peak Crusader. On Nov. 17, an opinion piece written by Sarah Brimhall advocating the formation of a Gay Straight Alliance at the school appeared alongside an opposing view written by Graham's daughter, Elise.

Then, on May 15, a news piece and an opinion piece, both written by Brimhall, addressed a vaccination for human papilloma virus, which can be spread by sexual contact. In the opinion piece, Brimhall wrote that teaching abstinence is not enough to prevent the spread of HPV. "The promotion of abstinence is placed above the prevention of a disease that claims thousands of lives each year," she wrote.

A news release from the foundation said the articles violated two Utah education laws. One law "forbids schools from allowing any activity which results in students revealing information concerning their sexual behavior, orientation or attitudes," according to the news release. The other "requires that schools stress the importance of abstinence from all sexual activity before marriage and fidelity after marriage, and also forbids advocacy of homosexuality and of sexual activity outside of marriage."

Graham said he and his wife met with Nate Phillips, faculty adviser for the newspaper, and principal Chip Koop, but were unhappy with the results.

"Sex activists are targeting kids," Graham said. "They know that high school newspapers can be highly effective carriers of anti-parent, pro-sex propaganda. School administrators are either complicit or clueless."

James Fisher, assistant professor lecturer in the department of communication at the University of Utah, said far more egregious content would be needed to break any laws. "That is not a promotion of premarital sex," he said.

Phillips has attended workshops at the university about media law, Fisher said. "He understands the law as well as any high school adviser."

The school appears to be on strong legal footing, he said.

Linda Peterson, president of the Utah Headliners chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists, said if the piece is found to be within the law, she would be worried that Graham is advocating censorship.

"While high school students are just students, they are covered by the First Amendment. Wherever possible by the law, adults in the greater community should uphold their right to express their opinion," she said.

If the opinion pieces were clearly labeled as such, the students met their obligation to distinguish them from news, Peterson said.

Since the first meeting with Graham, the paper has been scrutinized more carefully, Koop said. "We've had the Alpine School District advise us on where lines are and what we need to be careful about, so we try to do our best to do that, and at the same time allow students some freedom to investigate topics that are important to them."

But Graham said the school let parents down. "They have an obligation to protect the health and welfare of the students in their schools. Parents' concerns should be given utmost consideration, especially when matters of sexual morality and physical health risks are concerned."

Phillips said although he doesn't think the paper broke the law, "I think issues like this are really sensitive, and I understand parents being concerned about them."

Carol Lear, director of school law and legislation at the State Office of Education, said she does not plan to investigate the articles.

"I'm not going to do anything," Lear said. "If the school district asks my opinion, I would give it to them, but we just don't have a monitoring, punishing role."

Even if she had been consulted beforehand, Lear said deciding whether to publish the HPV articles would have been an easy call.

"To say if there was an article in a school newspaper about how many girls had been raped and to say that's promoting sexual activity, that's not accurate," Lear said. "It's just providing information. It doesn't promote it."

Anna Chang-Yen can be reached at 344-2549 or This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it