You are here: Home » News

FIRE gives ‘red light’ to BC speech code

By Andrew Slade, Gavel Media Team, on December 7, 2009 2:34 PM

By Andrew Slade, Editorial Assistant -

As members of learning communities, many students at Boston College and other private universities assume a right to speak and express themselves as they choose. For the most part, these assumptions are accurate in their representation of the manner in which schools treat student speech, but private institutions reserve the right to restrict those freedoms.

In an effort to protect individual rights of students and faculty at American colleges, a Philadelphia-based organization known as the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) has been evaluating speech codes and related actions taken by schools across the country for the last 10 years.

FIRE’s Web site offers a system through which schools are rated at one of three tiers: green, yellow and red lights. According to their site, a green light is given to a school whose policies are not seriously threatening to the free speech rights of students. A yellow-light school is one with at least one policy that restricts a “limited amount of protected expression.” BC’s red light means that “the threat to free speech … is obvious.”

The BC FIRE profile outlines a number of written policies and events which have transpired, prompting the foundation to give BC its harshest rating. Most notable among these was the cancellation of an on-campus speaking event featuring Bill Ayers by University administrators. According to FIRE Program Associate and BC graduate Kyle Smeallie, “the Ayers incident was the most recent and well-known, but there are a multitude of incidents and policies that prompted FIRE to rate BC as a ‘red light’ school.”

In 2003, for instance, FIRE explains that BC attempted to restrict the autonomy of The Heights by pushing for the establishment of an advisory board controlled by the BC administration. They additionally affirm that administrators wished to restrict Heights advertisements and force them to “‘fully comply’ with Boston College policies.” Similarly, FIRE indicates that in 2006, the Office of First Year Experience confiscated all 3,000 copies of a freshman orientation issue of The Heights known as The Guide.

More recently, FIRE alleges that administrators contacted the BC Police Department and took disciplinary action against six students who, on April Fool’s Day of 2008, posted flyers satirizing certain service trips by advertising a “Black Baby Petting Zoo.” Senior Associate Dean for Student Development Paul Chebator is described as having acknowledged that the students’ intent was not racist, but that the flyer could be interpreted as racist.

Another factor that contributed to the rating was the fact that BC President Fr. William P. Leahy, S.J. failed to respond to two separate letters that FIRE sent him, asking for clarification of the University’s position.

FIRE acknowledges that as a private institution, BC is within its rights to limit speech as it sees fit, stating that “[u]nless BC openly admits that it is not truly dedicated to free expression (which is its right as a private college) or removes its speech restrictions, BC will keep its ‘red light’ rating so that prospective students know that BC will not honor its stated commitments to freedom of expression should they choose to attend.”

As a private institution, BC is entitled to cancel events, as they did when Ayers was to speak, whenever the administration deems such actions necessary. FIRE takes issue with what they say is the administrations tendency to take advantage of these rights, undercutting their written position on expression.

On the BC Web site outlining behavioral policies, the Office of the Dean of Student Development asserts the “necessity of the presentation of opposing viewpoints and an openness to confrontation between ideas” to achieve a “meaningful commitment to society.” It goes on to state that “[t]he involvement of the University or its students in this process cannot achieve any meaning if the methods of engagement, reason, and dialogue are inhibited or constrained.”

FIRE makes clear that BC’s red light is not simply the result of its arguably suppressive actions; there are other schools listed as “not rated” for being completely open about their “dedication to certain values more than to free expression.” As FIRE indicates, however, BC’s actions seem to be contradicting its stated policy.

BC administrators were unable to be reached for comment at this time.