https://www.realcleareducation.com/articles/2021/10/01/the_worst_campus_in_america_for_free_speech_110642.html
Inside the 2021 College Free Speech Rankings
For the second straight year, survey data shows that a small private school in western Indiana is the nation’s worst college for free speech.
DePauw University again finished last in the 2021 College Free Speech Rankings, the second annual campus-speech-related survey and rankings project sponsored by the research firm College Pulse, the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE), and RealClearEducation. More than 37,000 students at 159 colleges and universities participated in the survey, and their responses helped determine each school’s place in the 2021 rankings.
What contributed to DePauw’s low ranking? Survey results and student responses to open-ended survey prompts suggest that DePauw’s biggest speech-related challenge may be the censorious views of its students. Only 30% of DePauw students said it was “never acceptable” to use violence to stop a speech on campus, meaning more than two-thirds of students surveyed feels violence can be an appropriate response to disagreeable speech. Seventy-six percent of students surveyed said they would oppose allowing a speaker on campus who believed abortion should be illegal. Some students feel censorship is the appropriate response to speakers with “harmful” views.
“I do not hold views that are harmful to others so [self-censorship] is not a problem I face,” one DePauw student told pollsters.
Only seven percent of DePauw students reported having “never” felt unable to express their opinion on a subject.
Many DePauw students also lack confidence in the administration’s commitment to free speech. Only 57% of DePauw students felt the administration was likely to defend a speaker’s right to express himself in a speech-related controversy, compared to 89% of students surveyed at top-ranked Claremont McKenna College.