The University of Washington has been ranked among the worst public university for free speech by the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE).

Informed by a survey of more than 55,000 college students across the country, as well as legal analysis done by FIRE itself, the 2023-2024 rankings place the UW 178th out of 248 schools assessed. In the 2022-2023 academic year, UW was ranked the lowest of all public institutions surveyed.

Among FIRE’s findings is that 69% of UW students say shouting down a speaker to prevent them from speaking on campus is at least rarely acceptable. 40% of students say they have self-censored on campus at least once or twice a month. 56% of students say they are worried about damaging their reputation because someone misunderstands something they have said or done. These and other findings indicate a critically poor culture of free speech at UW.

Additionally, restrictive speech codes at UW imperil the First Amendment rights of students, faculty, and staff. UW's Executive Order No. 31, nominally an anti-harassment policy, is presently entangled in a pending federal lawsuit and has been challenged as unconstitutionally vague and overbroad. The university can use such a policy to selectively punish speech with which the administration disagrees.

Amid the recent Israel-Palestine protests on college campuses across the country, questions have been raised regarding the free speech commitments of our institutions of higher learning. Congress has passed a misguided condemnation of colleges attempting to protect the right to protest. But the principles of free speech must protect even speech seen as hateful by most or all of the campus community.

These things must change. It is time for UW to adopt the Chicago Statement.

The Chicago Statement is a free speech policy statement produced by the Committee on Freedom of Expression at the University of Chicago. Since its adoption in 2015, it has served as a model for statements in support of free speech principles at institutions of higher learning across the country.

More than 100 colleges and universities have endorsed or adopted some version of the Chicago Statement, including Princeton, Johns Hopkins, Georgetown, and, most recently, the University of Michigan.

UW should be next on that list.

UW’s adoption of the Chicago Statement would do the following:

• Signal to the campus community that UW cares about freedom of expression.
• Acknowledge that the proper role of the university is not to coddle students or to protect them from challenging ideas.
• Disavow censorship of faculty, students, or guest speakers simply on the grounds that their speech may be offensive to some or even most of the campus community.
• Set an expectation that students come to campus ready to engage with challenging and uncomfortable ideas.

For the full text of the original Chicago Statement, click here.

Stand up for your rights and the rights of others. Sign the petition. Hold UW accountable to the First Amendment and demand that the University of Washington adopt the Chicago Statement.

This petition is a project of Huskies for Liberty, a Registered Student Organization at the University of Washington.