Hamline University was named one of the nation’s worst colleges for free speech after punishing an adjunct professor who showed a historic painting of the Prophet Muhammad in class, but the Minnesota college wasn’t the only offender.
The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression released Thursday its 12th edition of America’s “10 Worst Colleges for Free Speech,” a ranking that includes Penn State, the University of Oregon and the University of Pennsylvania.
“Each year, FIRE bestows a special dishonor upon a select group of American colleges that go above and beyond in their efforts to trample expressive freedom,” the foundation said. “These are the schools that stopped at nothing to crush faculty rights, destroy student expression, and leave guest speakers in the dust.”
The organization also gave its “lifetime censorship award” to Georgetown University for “its longstanding commitment to, well, censorship — of everyone from an incoming libertarian lecturer to students campaigning for Bernie Sanders.”
Indeed, the foundation has become what the American Civil Liberties Union once was — a staunch defender of free-speech rights regardless of the political or ideological views being expressed.
The honorees included universities that snuffed speech on the right and the left. The University of Oregon was named for “compelling faculty to pledge allegiance to contested ideological views” by using a diversity, equity and inclusion rubric for evaluating statements made by faculty applicants.
SEE ALSO: Hamline University retreats on Islamophobia comments as ex-professor sues
At the other end of the political spectrum, Texas A&M and Tennessee Tech were cited for cracking down on campus drag shows.
FIRE attorney Alex Morey said the foundation “gave each school on the list multiple opportunities to do the right thing.”
“Instead, they’ve shown just how committed they are to violating student and faculty rights,” Ms. Morey said. “This list should be a warning to anyone considering joining one of these college or university communities. Think again.”
Who’d be your list of the worst colleges for free speech? https://t.co/NvLIwlt1b2 pic.twitter.com/IQutOHUwjJ
— FIRE (@TheFIREorg) February 2, 2023
Hamline landed on FIRE’s radar for denouncing adjunct professor Erika Lopez Prater after a student complained about an online lecture that featured two historic images of Muhammad, including a 14th-century painting hailed as an artistic masterpiece.
The foundation issued a complaint last month against Hamline with its accreditation board, and Ms. Lopez Prater sued the university for defamation and religious discrimination.
The school did not rehire her for the spring semester, even though the department chair had expressed interest in doing so previously, the lawsuit said.
Hamline backpedaled after the lawsuit was filed Jan. 17, admitting to a “misstep” and saying its use of the term “Islamophobic” to describe the lecture was “flawed.”
Georgetown earned FIRE’s “highest lowest honor” for being a repeat offender on speech on both the right and left, the foundation said.
In late 2021, Georgetown suspended incoming faculty member Ilya Shapiro, a prominent libertarian legal scholar, then took 122 days to finish its investigation and reinstate him over a tweet about Supreme Court candidates. Mr. Shapiro quit in June as soon as he was reinstated.
The Catholic University had previously made the list for refusing to recognize a student pro-choice group and stopping students from tabling for 2016 Democratic presidential primary candidate Bernard Sanders.
FIRE President and CEO Greg Lukianoff said that speech suppression in education has run rampant in the last few years.
“Since 2020, we’ve seen an upswing in campus censorship unlike anything I’ve encountered in my 22-year career,” Mr. Lukianoff said. “You’d think they’d eventually run out of students and professors to censor, but no such luck in 2022. Fingers crossed for 2023.”
• Valerie Richardson can be reached at vrichardson@washingtontimes.com.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.