From Campus Reform, the South Dakota Board of Regents decided that it might be prudent for state universities to uphold free speech. Which really raises the question of what they were doing before, and demands that the Legislature continue to look over their shoulders:
Among the policy changes, public universities in South Dakota will no longer be able to discriminate against “any student or student organization” based on viewpoint or ideology. Student organizations will also be able to require members to “affirm and adhere to the organization’s sincerely held beliefs.”
A South Dakota Board of Regents spokeswoman told Campus Reform that the board approved all three free speech policies.
and…
The report also has to include if any events on campus “impeded intellectual diversity and the free exchange of ideas.”
“The ideas of different members of the institutions’ community will often and quite naturally conflict, and some individuals’ ideas will even conflict with the institutions’ values and principles,” the policy reads. “But it is not the proper role of the Board or the institutions to attempt to shield individuals from viewpoints they find unwelcome, disagreeable, or even deeply offensive.”
Weren’t they supposed to be doing this already? Free speech and all.
Glad they’ve finally come to the realization that they need to put it on paper that “it is not the proper role of the Board or the institutions to attempt to shield individuals from viewpoints they find unwelcome, disagreeable, or even deeply offensive.” We’ll see if they practice what they have finally come around to preaching.
Well that is progress. Good for the Board of Regents.
agree