In November 2020, Speech First, a national membership group of students, alumni, and others that defends free speech on campus, sent a letter to Syracuse University’s president and board of trustees. Along with the letter, Speech First delivered 2,333 petition signatures from students, alumni, and concerned citizens urging the university to revise its Code of Student Conduct, its STOP Bias and Residential Bias Prevention policies, and its University Events Policy.
Earlier that summer, Syracuse broadened its anti-harassment policy to cover the “[a]ssistance, participation in, promotion of, or perpetuation of conduct, whether physical, electronic, oral, written, or video, which threatens the mental health, physical health, or safety of anyone.” This language could let the university punish not only wrongdoers but also students who witness an incident, discuss it with friends, or share an opinion about it publicly.
On paper, Syracuse promises to “welcome[] and encourage[] the expression of dissent” and to protect “the free speech rights of the members of its community.” But those protections have been applied unequally:
- Two conservative students were harassed and sent death threats online, but received no acknowledgment or help from the administration. Meanwhile, a progressive student activist group’s public protest and list of demands led to immediate policy changes.
- A chemistry professor was put on leave for using the term “Wuhan flu” on his syllabus, while another professor who told students he would not tolerate support for President Trump in his classroom faced no consequences.
Speech First warned that the broadened policies will keep putting students at risk for expressing views that don’t fit the majority ideology on campus, and recommended specific revisions.
Read the full letter below:
