How a Cheerleader's Snapchat Profanity Could Shape the Limits of Students' Free Speech

Brandi Levy was wrapping up her freshman year in high school in May 2017 when she learned she did not make the varsity cheerleading team for the next school year and would again be assigned to the junior varsity squad.Her emotional response has embroiled her and her school district in a legal dispute now before the U.S. Supreme Court that could reshape the status of student free-speech rights—online speech in particular—for the first time in more than a generation.“I was really frustrated,” Levy said. She had been told cheerleaders needed a year of JV before making varsity at Mahanoy Area High School in Pennsylvania, yet an incoming freshman girl was chosen for the top squad. Around this same time, Levy had failed to get the right fielder’s spot she wanted on her softball team. And school finals were also wearing on her.“F*** school f*** softball f*** cheer f*** everything” said Levy’s now infamous posting on Snapchat on a Saturday that May. In case the profanities didn’t get the message across to her circle of 250 friends on the social media network, Levy (and a friend) displayed their middle fingers to the camera.Levy was at an off-campus convenience store called the…
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