Arizona universities get top marks for protecting students’ free speech
Arizona’s public universities received high marks from The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression for using codes of conduct that protect First Amendment rights.
The organization on Wednesday published its annual report evaluating major universities’ student codes of conduct. Arizona State University, the University of Arizona and Northern Arizona University all received “green lights” in the Spotlight on Speech Codes report after the organization determined their policies, “do not seriously threaten student expression.”
This year, the organization analyzed codes of conduct from 489 schools — both public and private. Of them, 20% were given “red lights” for having at least one policy that “both clearly and substantially restricts freedom of speech,” or requires a school login to see the guidelines. “Yellow lights” were given to 65% of the schools for having policies that “could too easily be applied to suppress protected speech.”
The foundation said much of the time, schools are dinged for policies that are too broad and put protected speech at risk.
The report does not take into account how universities enforce their codes in practice, but the organization also publishes “free speech rankings” which include surveys given to students on campus. In the 2024 report, ASU and UA both received average rankings and NAU received an above-average ranking.
Republican legislators previously criticized the state’s public universities for what they said was the stifling of conservative speech on their campuses — particularly after an event hosted at ASU featuring conservative speakers. Some went as far as to threaten ASU’s funding.
The debate taking place in the Ad Hoc Committee on Freedom of Expression at Arizona’s Universities was boycotted by committee Democrats who said the committee was no longer a service to the public and “was nothing more than grandstanding” in November.
Helen Rummel covers higher education for The Arizona Republic. Reach her at hrummel@azcentral.com. Follow her on X, formerly Twitter: @helenrummel.
This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Arizona universities recognized for codes protecting free speech
