A federal appeals court heard oral arguments this month in a case concerning whether college newspapers have greater free-speech rights than high-school newspapers do.

The full panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit is reconsidering a decision by a three-judge panel of the same court, which found that a 1988 Supreme Court decision that gave wide latitude to high-school administrators to review and censor student publications does not apply to student newspapers at public colleges.

The latest lawsuit was filed by two editors of The Innovator, the student newspaper at Governors State University, who say that their free-speech rights were violated when a university dean telephoned the paper's printer and asked him not to print the paper until an administrator approved it.

During the oral arguments, a lawyer for the university argued that the dean, Patricia A. Carter, wanted to check for spelling and grammar errors that might reflect poorly on the Illinois university, noting that the newspaper's tagline is "the newspaper of Governors State University."

The lawyer said the newspaper had always been reviewed by a faculty adviser before publication, and that there was no legal difference between that and a review by an administrator.

A lawyer who spoke on behalf of the student editors, Margaret L. Hosty and Jeni S. Porche, argued that the faculty adviser had only offered advice, and that Ms. Carter's call to the printer was illegal prior review. "What she said was, 'This will not be published without my approval,'" the attorney said.

A decision is expected in the next few months.