Advertising in public schools is back in the news as School Media’s (sic), a new Coon Rapids, Minnesota-based company, begins to pitch their in-school advertising and locker-wrapping services to area schools, including Centennial School District:

Centennial schools may soon tout everything from Crayola crayons to Nickelodeon’s “Dora the Explorer” on their lockers.

Centennial School District was scheduled to vote on using School Media’s services a week ago, but didn’t [pdf]:

Advertising in Schools: Superintendent Stremick shared the feedback received on advertising in the schools. Discussion followed. Board would like gather more feedback from community and district staff before proceeding further. No School Board action was required.

The story hit the AP wire and got the attention of FOX & Friends, a morning talk show on the FOX News Network. The producer contacted me while considering doing a segment on the topic. It’s since postponed, but she asked to contact me again “as the story develops.”

Advertising in schools, called a “sacred cow” by the National School Public Relations Association, has long been debated as schools struggle to find solutions to their funding problems. (See also: Will new Minnesota legislation invite corporate interests into the classroom?) These are especially tough times for schools, which have been put in the position of coming up with their own creative solutions to the problems created by state and federal governments and/or mismanaged school districts (depending on who you ask).

Enter corporate marketers like PepsiCo or ad brokers like the now-defunct Bus Radio or School Media’s, who bring funding solutions to schools in a seemingly win-win situation: The schools get to hire the teachers they need, and the companies make a profit. So what’s the harm?

The harm has been documented in reports by the Commercialism in Education Research Unit at Arizona State University since 1998:

It is easy to understand why marketers would target children. They influence their parents’ spending, they spend a lot of money themselves, and when they develop preferences for brands in childhood, their loyalty often lasts a lifetime. Because children spend so much time in schools, corporations pursue access to them . . . . For their part, school districts, especially those facing higher costs and shrinking budgets, often see advertising as a potential source of additional funds. Some are also attracted to advertising and marketing activities because they believe that participating in such activities demonstrates goodwill toward the business community.

. . . Overall, marketing activities in schools actively threaten high-quality education by causing psychological, health-related, and academic harm to students. Commercial activities offer children experiences primarily intended to serve the sponsors and not the children themselves; they are therefore inherently “mis-educative,” because they promote unreflective consumption rather than critical thinking and rational decision making.

Emphasis mine. Corporate advertising messages in schools are in a direct conflict with the purpose and goals of education. Watch Nickelodeon! while researchers and educators are trying to encourage kids to move away from screens and into books. Eat Doritos! and Drink Pepsi! while nutritionists and district food services are working desperately to teach good eating habits and stem obesity.

Why don’t companies pursue placing ads in front of parents, instead? District websites, for example, are probably more frequented by adults than children. Could it be that it’s more cost-effective to influence a child — with years of spending power ahead — than it is to try to persuade adults to change their buying habits?

Children are easier targets, indeed.

As a parent who advocates for ethical marketing, I often hear the counterarguments: If you don’t like the ads, just turn off your television/don’t allow that website/don’t read those magazines. And that’s just what I do.

But I can’t keep my kids out of school.

Here’s a comment from a Facebook posting I read (status is private so you’ll have to trust me) about School Media’s wrapped lockers:

Locker ads are especially offensive to me. That locker is the closest thing a student has to a personal space while at school. It’s an anchor to personal sanity in an otherwise hectic, depersonalizing environment.

CCFC’s Josh Golin offers some advice to districts considering working with in-school advertising companies in Thinking About Allowing Advertising in Your School? Do Your Homework.

More from the Commercialism in Education Research Unit:

Policy and Statutory Responses to Advertising and Marketing in Schools (2010)
Click: The Twelfth Annual Report on Schoolhouse Commercialism Trends: 2008-2009
At Sea in a Marketing-Saturated World: The Eleventh Annual Report on Schoolhouse Commercialism Trends: 2007-2008
Adrift: Schools in a Total Marketing Environment. The Tenth Annual Report on Schoolhouse Commercialism Trends: 2006-2007
The Ninth Annual Report on Schoolhouse Commercialism Trends: 2005-2006
Empty Calories: Commercializing Activities in America’s Schools (2005)
Virtually Everywhere: Marketing to Children in America’s Schools (2004)
No Student Left Unsold (2003)
What’s in a Name? The Corporate Branding of America’s Schools (2002)
Buy Me! Buy Me! (2001)
Commercialism@School.com (2000)
Cashing in on Kids (1999)
Sponsored Schools and Commercialized Classrooms (1998)

Cash-strapped schools are in the news again as many districts consider turning to in-school advertising. What’s the issue? Read this post I wrote earlier this year for Change.org, Corporate Advertising: Not the Solution to Funding Woes.

It’s not just parents who are concerned with the ethics of corporate marketing. Four St. Paul students have been named Youth Advocates of the Year by the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids. The group, members of the Ramsey Tobacco Coalition, were honored last week in Washington, D.C.

When the students –  Brian Bell, Shanicee Dillon, Calitta Jones and Jeremiah Carter — discovered that stores in their neighborhood were selling candy cigarettes, bubble gum called “Big League Chew” and novelty lighters, they decided to do something about it. They met with St. Paul City Council Member Melvin Carter, who agreed to introduce an ordinance banning the products if the group helped: The students had to  conduct a community assessment of the problem, educate the other council members, and rally support for their presentation in the council chambers.

So they did. And as a result, the city council voted unanimously to ban the sale of candy “tobacco” products. St. Paul is the first city in the country to do so.

Since the ordinance went into effect, the youth have helped the city monitor stores for compliance and assisted in media and educational campaigns. The group currently is working to increase the tax rate for small cigars and to stop tobacco industry funding of nonprofit organizations that work with youth.

The Ramsey Tobacco Coalition works to reduce the harm caused by tobacco in Ramsey County. Members target youth access via tobacco-free school grounds policies, tobacco-free park policies, tobacco-free policies for clubs and youth-serving agencies and Ramsey County and St. Paul smoke-free workplace laws.

It took a national public health crisis. But it looks like marketing to children has finally found a home in the nation’s spotlight.

The May issue of Scientific American tackles it head-on with Underage, Overweight: The Federal Government Needs to Halt the Marketing of Unhealthy Foods to Kids. Citing the recent study that linked television commercials – not simply sitting in front of a TV but the commercials themselves – with obesity, the editors at Scientific American call on the FDA to create and enforce mandatory standards for food and beverage marketing to children.

The estimated cost of treating obesity-related ailments in adults was $147 billion for 2009. With the health care system already faltering, allowing companies to decide for themselves whether to peddle junk food to kids is a fox-and-henhouse policy this country simply cannot afford any longer.

Scientists and parents and health professionals and teachers are waking up to the idea that maybe, just maybe, corporations shouldn’t be spending billions of dollars to convince kids to want things that are bad for them.

And maybe, just maybe, since corporations are not going to stop on their own, it’s time for someone to step in.

Agencies who should be doing something now are instead putting their time and effort into advertising literacy campaigns. The FTC recently unveiled Admongo, an online game to teach kids how to decipher the very ads that shouldn’t be directed at them in the first place.  Why not just go after the advertisers? Seems the FTC was careful not to alienate any corporate campaign donors when creating Admongo, in fact, they’ve partnered with Scholastic, the single largest offender of bringing corporate advertising directly into the classroom via licensed-character-laden books. [Read also: Government Program Teaches Kids to Gaze at Ads Better]

Thanks for the help, FTC.

Yet we know the climate is changing. Our friends at Cynopsis Media recently talked to some cable network types to get their sense of what they expected to happen this year in advertising. Jackie Kulesza from Starcom:

There are a lot of factors that play into kids marketplace. There are discussions outside of our advertising world in Washington about this space and it continues to be a concern from a regulatory perspective. This administration might be bringing a different tone.

But don’t tell this to the corporations and their taxpayer subsidized marketing and advertising departments. They want to buy what Adweek is selling:

Kids want what they want when they want it. The little centers-of-our-universe can beg and plead for their essentials — toys, snacks and TV shows — with unfettered determination. Turns out that parents, television networks and marketers are working double time to oblige.

Nice. This is from Adweek’s What Kids Want: A Special Issue. It continues:

Marketers too are seeking to box out competitors by altering food products to reduce the dreaded salt, sugar and fat content in kids snacks. Are they doing too little too late to make an impact on kids health? Are their efforts just a smoke and mirrors move aimed at duping parents and kids to buy more bad food? Depends who you ask.

Asked and answered.

Image courtesy ford.

Announcing my new gig at Change.org where I’ll be writing about all things education. For my initial post I played it pretty safe and wrote what I knew: Corporate Advertising: Not the Solution to Funding Woes.

If you’re not familiar with Change.org, please take a moment to check it out. It’s a unique site highlighting specific social and environmental causes using informative blogs and petitions. There’s a fundraising component (in fact, I chose Change.org to host PEM’s fundraising well over a year ago). Plus it’s a social networking site. And it’s ad-free!

I am thrilled to be part of the Change.org team and hope you’ll stop by often. Be sure to drop me a line if there’s an education issue you’d like to see covered.

Ran across this webinar sponsored by the National School Public Relations Association:

Commercial Advertising in Schools? Take that Sacred Cow to Market!
Friday Jan. 29, 2010

Summary: Advertising has long been taboo in public education, but severe budget reductions and shortfalls now have districts rethinking their options. Learn how two innovative school systems challenged the status quo and skewered the sacred cow of “no advertising” to tap new sources of funding while promoting student success.

Moderator: Rich Bagin, APR, executive director, NSPRA

Panelists: Ken Blackstone, APR, director, communication services; and Steve Walts, Ed.D., superintendent, Prince William County Public Schools, Manassas, Va.; and Steve Valdez, director, instructional television, Weslaco (Texas) Independent School District

It’s bad enough when companies try to convince administrators that marketing in schools is inevitable — now cash-strapped districts may begin promoting it.

I hope these webinar attendees would also consider reading Click: The Twelfth Annual Report on Schoolhouse Commercialism Trends: 2008-2009:

As part of their efforts to create a total advertising environment, companies continue to aggressively market in school to children and youth. Advertisers now routinely blur the boundaries between editorial content and advertising in an effort to thoroughly infuse childhood with marketing messages. . . .

This year‘s report considers how marketing and advertising subtly help shape children‘s socialization into values associated with commercialism. Although commercialism isn‘t explicitly included as part of the curriculum, it is taught subtly in school environments that include marketing and advertising. As marketing messages promote particular products, they simultaneously promote values that validate and support commercialism.

Last week’s FCC report to Congress  (.pdf) on BusRadio, the company that supplies commercial radio content and advertising to a captive audience of children on school buses, found that:

– BusRadio understates the amount of its commercial content (p. 18)

– BusRadio exploits the relationship between its on-air personalities and young listeners by having its DJs pitch products directly to students (p.20).

– BusRadio’s programming and website for students fail to maintain a clear between editorial and commercial content, as required by the Children’s Advertising Review Unit (p.20 & 21).

– BusRadio’s website for parents “fails to enable parents to avoid exposure of their children to undesirable content” (p.13). 

Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood, who requested the report, says:

The FCC’s report provides an objective source for school districts evaluating BusRadio’s services.  We agree with the FCC that school districts should “elicit early and active involvement by parents and caregivers in any decision relating to BusRadio or similar services” (p.21). . . . We also urge state legislators to use this report to educate themselves about BusRadio, and to join New York and South Carolina in banning advertising on school buses.

CCFC encourages parents to send the FCC report directly to their school board.

Thankfully, I don’t have to worry about this in Minneapolis. Our board already has a policy in place (.pdf) to prevent commercial exploitation of children in schools:

Neither the facilities, the staff, nor the children of the schools shall be employed in any manner for advertising or otherwise promoting the interests of any commercial, political, or other non-school agency . . . .

I would argue, however, that some of the sanctioned antics of corporations like Scholastic, Target, or PepsiCo violate this policy.

One word: Insidious.

They’re not so lucky in Florida, where a school board is considering a proposal that gives a company called School Partnerships “exclusive rights to sell naming rights for school facilities and advertising to appear on district property, uniforms, Web sites or printed materials.”

Volusia County School Board members, who still are studying details of the proposal, said they understand concerns about advertising on campus but most are leaning toward giving it a try.

“We do have to look at alternatives about how we’re going to fund programs in our district,” Chairwoman Diane Smith said.

A classic argument, but I’d say one that shows a general lack of imagination.

I’ll point out this comment on the article, because it reflects my thoughts during the Obama school speech “controversy:”

Excuse me…didn’t we JUST spend an incredible amount of time, energy and airspace debating the perils of indoctrinating our children? I think listening to a motivating speech by the President of the United States is a whole lot less threatening to our kids than having them exposed to constant advertisement of unhealthy products, banks with questionable ethics, and stores that often treat their employees as just another commodity! I have never been a home school advocate, but if this comes into play, I might just have to consider keeping my kids home…not for just a day…but through the 12th grade!

A quick memo to parents concerned that their children will be a captive audience to President Obama’s speech to school children today: I understand your worries.

My full-time job is in public education, so I’ve heard from lots of folks concerned about what their children might hear.

In between calls from parents last week, I also found out that a shoe buyer from Minneapolis’ Target Corporation was hoping to make appointments to stop by some Minneapolis schools to check out what the kids are wearing on their feet.

Talk about captive. Don’t parents want to know if their children are going to be used as research subjects?

But such is nature of public schools. Some children will be a captive audience today; most children are a captive audience every day. Corporate capitalists have long had free access to children in schools, teaching them to be loyal to brands without question. That owning more will make you successful and happy. And that good Americans are good consumers.

How? Take the shoe-selling Target brand and its famous red logo. Target awards grants to help schools pay for field trip transportation. But, as part of the deal, kids return from their trips carrying a black Target-logoed backback, essentially making every one of them a walking ad.

Of course it’s not just the Target Corporation. Junior Achievement is allowed free access to your kids, as are companies like Bus Radio (to and from school),  PepsiCo (in the lunchroom), Procter and Gamble (in health class), McDonald’s (on report cards), Piper Jaffray (in high school), and Scholastic (everywhere), among many others. 

So, parents, I understand your concerns. Sanctioned messages that go against my values appear in my children’s classrooms all the time.

Thankfully, it looks like the President’s speech will be pretty innocuous.

My advice? After the speech, which they will probably hear or read at some point, talk to them. Ask them what they heard. Tell them what you think about what President Obama said. Point out any differences in the values you hold for your family and the message that they heard.

Because after all, as I’ve been told many times, you can’t shield your child from the evils of the outside world.

But you can talk to your kids. At least that’s what I do.