Posts Tagged FIRE

Students in the Limelight

The Huffington Post has launched a college section of its website to focus on student issues.  This is a positive sign for the student movement that more and more news outlets understand the importance of students and the vital role that education plays in shaping our society.

Today, friend of Students For Liberty and FIRE President Greg Lukianoff kicked off the new HuffPo college section with his article Is College Censorship Destroying Our Society’s “Sophistication Machine”? In it he explains that the biggest challenge facing higher education today is not a lack of state funding but the often oppressive intellectual atmosphere on college campuses created by speech codes and other forms of censorship:

In my opinion, higher education is supposed to work as a sort of “sophistication machine” for our society. That is, it is supposed to help us produce a citizenry with a deep, nuanced, complex, and multifaceted understanding of the issues confronting our nation and world. Many critics of higher education point to ideological imbalance within the faculty, grade inflation and diminishing academic rigor, or the increased corporatization of the university as factors that prevent it from fulfilling this crucial function. These are all problems worth investigating. But I believe the most important factor interfering with the success and credibility of higher education is the continuing maintenance of campus speech codes and other policies and practices designed to discourage and even punish free speech and meaningful dissent.

Read the whole article here: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/greg-lukianoff/is-college-censorship-des_b_485376.html

While the academy is supposed to be the heart of open intellectual discourse, we students of liberty know this is often not the case.  The intellectual atmosphere on campus is commonly one of group think and ostracization for those who dare to question the orthodoxy.   That is why the mission of the student movement for liberty is so critical.  If the sfllogo_colorfaculty and administrators will not embrace an open dialogue, then it is up to us to bring the ideas of liberty to the forefront.  It is our mission to show our fellow students that liberty is not a fringe idea that can be brushed aside, but an intellectually strong and rigorous philosophy that must be taken seriously.

As the Huffington Post’s expansion of college coverage shows, there rest of the world is beginning to pay attention to these issues.  Now it is up to us to ensure that when others look at our universities they see communities where the ideas of liberty thrive.

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Students Rights Week

You’ve Learned Their Rules, Now Learn Your Rights!

Anyone who has been through freshman orientation knows what a brainwashing experience it can be. Administrators and counselors spend days lecturing incoming students on what they cannot say on campus, what the campus police are allowed to do at their whim, and the many ways that students are supposed to conform to the university’s will.

We students who believe in liberty, though, think freshmen need to hear the other side of the story.  Students need to know that the US Constitution gives them rights that do not end at the entryway to the ivory tower, that freedom of speech is paramount in higher education and there are limits to police power.  That is why SFL will be sponsoring the first ever Students Rights Week.  We invite all pro-liberty student groups across the country to join us in this important venture to make known what rights students have on campus.

We will provide the materials. You put them in the hands of students at your university by flyering the campus, setting up a table in the public square, bringing in a speaker, and hosting a movie night. Available resources include:

Students Rights Week will be the first week of school on every campus, ideally after new student orientation has occurred. The motto is “You’ve learned their rules, now learn your rights!” Not only is this a chance to educate your campus about students rights, but it is an opportunity to spread word about your organization and recruit new members.

Click here to learn more.

If you are interested in joining students across the U.S. by hosting a Students Rights Week on your campus, email Clark Ruper at cruper@studentsforliberty.org.

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