That's fair. I'm not a big fan of the "feel silenced" standard myself; that's the kind of standard that got us into this mess in the first place. I do think there is a role for the administration in cultivating an environment and a student body that tolerates minority views and opinions, but that's very difficult to judge, and kids "feeling silenced" is not a good benchmark.
That's fair. I'm not a big fan of the "feel silenced" standard myself; that's the kind of standard that got us into this mess in the first place. I do think there is a role for the administration in cultivating an environment and a student body that tolerates minority views and opinions, but that's very difficult to judge, and kids "feeling silenced" is not a good benchmark.
Yeah, and I'm not blaming any of the college students - going to a college that is supposed to be about intellectual freedom and then having your professor be a jerk to you because you actually participated in that project is a terrible experience! It's just a) something that can't really be fully gauged by surveying students who have only ever been to one school, and b) a different issue than an adminstration that actively punished students/staff/faculty for their speech.
There probably *is* a way to try to rank school by how much they have free speech culture and to what degree faculty have censorious tendencies, but it would be very hard and I think think FIRE has figured it out.
(funny enough my very censorious alma mater isn't even in their rankings!)
That's fair. I'm not a big fan of the "feel silenced" standard myself; that's the kind of standard that got us into this mess in the first place. I do think there is a role for the administration in cultivating an environment and a student body that tolerates minority views and opinions, but that's very difficult to judge, and kids "feeling silenced" is not a good benchmark.
Yeah, and I'm not blaming any of the college students - going to a college that is supposed to be about intellectual freedom and then having your professor be a jerk to you because you actually participated in that project is a terrible experience! It's just a) something that can't really be fully gauged by surveying students who have only ever been to one school, and b) a different issue than an adminstration that actively punished students/staff/faculty for their speech.
There probably *is* a way to try to rank school by how much they have free speech culture and to what degree faculty have censorious tendencies, but it would be very hard and I think think FIRE has figured it out.
(funny enough my very censorious alma mater isn't even in their rankings!)
I think it is very hard and the FIRE rankings are highly flawed, but scoring dead last probably does indicate a fairly bad culture.
Oh, no, was a professor mean to someone? That's a war crime/genocide right there.