As free-speech controversies continue to flare up around our nation’s colleges and universities — even virtually — surveys continue to show that viewpoint diversity is under attack, that students are regularly censoring themselves, and that they are fearful of expressing their real views. The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education — FIRE — has just released the largest study of student attitudes to date, and the data are sobering.
Sixty percent of students reported, for instance, that they could not express an opinion because of how students, a professor, or their administration would respond, and just 15 percent of students reported feeling very comfortable publicly disagreeing with a professor about a controversial topic. While findings such as these rightly generate considerable attention, I want to also note that there is a considerable amount of good news in the data that deserves mention and suggests that there is a sizable constituency on campuses that rejects the move to silence dissent.
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