On Oct. 10, 2024, Professor of Political Science Jim Simeone drove three students to ISU Bone Student Center to attend an American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) panelist discussion about freedom of speech on college campuses.
The Illinois and ISU chapters of the ACLU, as well as the Department of Politics and Government and the Center for Civic Engagement hosted “Lessons Learned from Freedom of Speech Concerns on Campuses.” Three panelists spoke on their experience with free speech exercise on college campuses.
Issues about free speech primarily concerned ISU administration’s response to student protest about divestment of funds from Israeli associations, including the arrest of seven students in the spring.
Simeone personally drove IWU students to attend the panel because he felt that it is important for students to know their free speech rights.
“Colleges should be places where you hear new and different ideas from the echo chambers you have built around yourself,” Simeone said. “We need to be confronted with new ideas to stay aware of what is going on in the world.”
While the panel was hosted at ISU and focused on controversy on their Public Forum campus, senior Quinn Gifford still felt that the conversation could be applied to IWU’s climate.
“We as students have the power and the numbers to demand administrative change,” Gifford said. “Colleges should not be able to control our freedom of speech because doing so silences our rights as American citizens.”
The panelists, ISU student Raseel Khwaiss, Professor of Communication Joseph Zompetti and Director of Communications and Public Policy for the ACLU Ed Yohnka expressed their dissatisfaction with ISU’s attempt to quiet student protest movements.
Khwaiss presented about the history of Israeli occupation in Palestine, commenting on ISU students’ mission to support Palestinian freedom and demand action from administration.
Khwaiss also highlighted the public bias of ISU administration and their unwillingness to schedule meetings with student advocates. She said this prevented ISU students from freely expressing their political opinions.
“She put into words how betrayed the students of ISU should feel by their institution, and the steps it took not only to drown out their ability to speak freely, but also to cover up their doing so afterwards,” Gifford said.
As a private university, IWU administration has more power than ISU to restrict students’ free speech, but Simeone felt that it does not entitle administration to silence protest material, such as chalking.
During the 2023-2024 academic year, IWU implemented policies restricting political chalking on campus sidewalks, requiring notice and permission to write political statements.
“We need to have a conversation about what we think the purpose of a university is. In my view, it is not about hygiene and clean sidewalks,” Simeone said.
Professor Zompetti said universities have implemented free speech policies that severely limit students’ ability to organize on campuses. Student protests can be shut down if they are not “content neutral, narrowly organized and maintaining an open line of communication with administration.”
“The purpose of higher education is to stimulate critical thinking and empower our students to be agents of change,” Zompetti said.
Senior Rowan Danou appreciated Zompetti’s point about creating dialogue between multiple perspectives. “Talking about issues is how we ease the pressure surrounding them, even if the dialogue doesn’t change anyone’s minds,” he said.
Simeone feels that it’s the faculty’s responsibility to empower students to be agents of change and to educate students about their democratic rights as American citizens.
“The administration can’t do anything at this point,” he said. “I don’t think the expression policies we have in place now, which emphasize hygiene and appearances, are serving that mission.”
Yohnka detailed his involvement in student protests during his undergraduate years. He participated in protests about his university’s ties to South African apartheid and the U.S. involvement in Vietnam.
He urged students to continue the long history of protest on college campuses. “There is a movement in this country to dismantle affirmative action in order to change who sits next to you in class,” Yohnka said. “You need to speak up about it.”
Yohnka said that university officials are tired of being embarrassed by student protests, and they are scared of the impact students can make on campuses by exercising their free speech rights.
“We need to have a few campus dialogues on the topic because our posting and expression policies have been written too strictly against expression or have been interpreted increasingly narrowly over the years,” Simeone said.
“I plan to bring up with other faculty members the issue of what kind of community we want our university to be,” he said.
Approval:
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IWU Students at the event expressed their distaste with the administration’s silence about free speech practices during small-group discussion.
“I don’t think our administration is doing a good enough job in promoting dialogue on issues,” Danou said. “I think students feel like they’ll have their voices shut down by the administration if the issues are too controversial.”
From this discussion, Danou and Gifford found themselves able to voice their concerns about the IWU campus’ lack of involvement in political discussion.
“We should try to question these decisions that our administration is making and fight for a campus where we can speak freely about what we want to see in the world,” Gifford said.