Setting aside a patio for free speech is not enough, argues FIRE (Foundation for Individual Rights in Education), which is going after Southwestern College in Chula Vista, California.
On October 22, 2009, a group of students and faculty members assembled in SWC’s free speech zone to protest various actions taken by the SWC administration. According to a professor who was in attendance, one of the students said, “Let’s go where they can hear us.” When some of the protesters reached the courtyard where SWC Superintendent/President Raj K. Chopra’s office is located, they were met by police officers who would not let them pass. Three faculty members who were with the group for different periods of time, and a fourth who was merely in the area, were placed on paid leave and banned from campus that night . . .
A faculty-student committee has proposed a new free-speech policy, but it continues to limit free expression of ideas, FIRE and the ACLU of San Diego argue.
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