Ken, I expect you're right that educators everywhere usually do what's right for their students regardless of whether the what the local legal climate may be, and rightly so.
The TEACH Act is useful in certain situations, but it has some limitations. One is that it only applies to government run schools or accredited non-profit schools. Say what you want about commercial schools, but this means that their students don't have the same access to knowledge that their peers in government and non-profit schools do. It also forces schools that take advantage of it to distribute materials that “accurately describe, and promote compliance with, the laws of United States relating to copyright.” Not sure how I feel about that, especially “ promoting compliance “ what if there's a group on campus that distributes materials that promote not complying with copyright?
The advantage of the TEACH Act is that it's a lot more clear cut than fair use. The problem with fair use is that there are enough overlapping gray areas that no checklist could provide a definitive answer. Even when people try to put together guidelines they're oversimplifications that might get those who follow them into trouble, e.g. http://kathyschrock.net/pdf/copyright_schrock.pdf
A statement of best practices would be better. I understand that media literacy educators are starting to work on this for themselves, I'm corresponding with them now about whether there's room in their initiative for all educators.
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