Five of the worst university policies restricting free speech in 2017

This past year’s political landscape has been quite tense with riots, protests, stand-outs, and demonstrations. Participants in these protests and nonviolent demonstrations were expressing their right to free speech, which is protected under the First Amendment. Unfortunately, many students across the country were restricted from participating in the aforementioned actions due to public universities infringing on freedom of speech through campus policies.

Public education, funded by taxpayers, must be free from any influence of the opinions of administrators or faculty. Our tax dollars should not go to a school to teach or promote one point of view. Rather, they must be dispassionate and promote the free discussion and cordial debate of ideas – even ideas with which the majority of students, or administration, may not agree.

To promote one point of view and censor another is infringing on the freedom of speech for those of the opposite view – the exact oppression that our founders wished to prevent when they wrote the Constitution.

The following five universities have speech code policies that restrict their students from free expression and speech: