Campus Protests and Free Expression

Elizabeth A. Harris and Alexandra Alter
New York Times

Excerpt: More than two years into a sharp rise in book challenges across the United States, restrictions are increasingly targeting public libraries, where they could affect not only the children’s section but also the books available to everyone in a community.

The shift comes amid a dramatic increase in efforts to remove books from libraries, according to a pair of new reports released this week from the American Library Association and PEN America, a free speech organization.

Graham Hillard
James G. Martin Center for Academic Renewal
 
Excerpt: On the evening of July 17, 2020, one of two things happened on a blocked thoroughfare in Charlottesville, Virginia. Either Morgan Bettinger, a rising senior at UVA, uttered a threatening and contemptible remark to Black Lives Matter protestors who were barring her way home. Or the young woman made an anodyne comment that was immediately—and perhaps intentionally—misunderstood.

A new lawsuit filed by Bettinger asks a jury to find that the University of Virginia, in responding to the incident, violated her rights.

Emma Camp
Reason Magazine
 
Excerpt: According to a new survey, only one-third of college students say it's never acceptable to shout down a controversial campus speaker. And one-quarter think using violence can be acceptable in at least some circumstances to stop someone from speaking on campus.

The highest-ranked schools consistently had "green" speech code ratings—a measure FIRE uses to indicate that a school's official policies do not trample student and faculty First Amendment rights—and administrations that consistently defended controversial speech. However, many of these same schools seem to have student bodies that aren't quite so tolerant.

Zach Weissmueller and Liz Wolfe
Reason Magazine
 
Excerpt: California Community Colleges' new teaching standards "mandate viewpoint conformity" and "compel professors to teach and preach the State's perspective," according to a lawsuit called Palsgaard v. Christian, filed by the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, or FIRE.  

Join Reason's Zach Weissmueller and Liz Wolfe this Thursday at 1 p.m. Eastern for a discussion with Jessie Appleby, an attorney with FIRE, and Bill Blanken, the plaintiff and a chemistry professor at Reedley College in California, who says the standards advanced by the state's community college board amount to "compelled speech" in the classroom.

KC Johnson
Chronicle of Higher Education

Excerpt: The Biden administration intends, in October, to release new Title IX regulations to deal with campus sexual assault and harassment. In their proposed form, the regulations strip from accused students virtually all of the procedural protections they currently have under Title IX, unless a local court ruling requires their college or university to employ a fairer process.

To understand why we are waiting for yet another set of Title IX regulations, it’s important to understand the history of the last 12 years.

PEN America Press Release

Excerpt: PEN America called on Daytona State College in Florida to reschedule a photo exhibition by Jon Henry in light of a dispute over why the show was cancelled. PEN America said the contentious development creates a “troubling precedent” and called on the college to offer to host the show in the future.