Previously unreleased data pulled by the Commission for Higher Education confirm conservative student sentiment is lower, but studies show Indiana ranks higher nationwide for tolerance of conservative speech on campus.
(FILE PHOTO: Sean Hogan / WTIU News)
This story has been updated. A previous version attributed a quote by Stevens to Coward.
Conservative students at public universities in Indiana are less likely to feel that they can “openly express their opinions” than their liberal classmates, according to survey data from the Indiana Commission for Higher Education (CHE).
A bill under consideration at the Statehouse has brought the question to light. SB 202 is intended to end “viewpoint discrimination.” The bill’s author, Sen. Spencer Deery (R-West Lafayette), has cited polling by the Commission and by Gallup that shows 46 percent of conservative-identifying students feel they can openly express their opinions on campus versus 79 percent of liberal students.
“Some of this certainly may be perception,” Deery said, “But I don’t believe that you can dismiss all of it as just that.”
Critics pointed out that the data released publicly by the Commission don’t show those numbers; they display perceptions by all students surveyed rather than groups self-reporting.
Indiana Public Media reached out to Deery and the Commission for confirmation. Previously unreleased data on self-reporting pulled by the Commission do, in fact, confirm those figures.
The 2023 Indiana Campus Free Speech Report gathered input from 18,559 students at the state’s public institutions – around 7.7 percent of students enrolled that year. A Commission spokesperson added that “due to low participation at some institutions, the Commission elected to include only high-level statewide data” in its public report.
State Rep. Jake Teshka (R-South Bend) referenced the study in session to justify his support for the bill.
The study’s author is FIRE’s Chief Research Advisor Sean Stevens. He said the rankings consider many factors, including surveys, analysis of campus policies and speakers greenlit or canceled on campus. Stevens said that while liberal-identifying students generally felt more comfortable expressing themselves (as they do at most universities), IU’s low ranking was largely due to other factors.
“If you actually dig into it,” he said, “the professors that were sanctioned that drove their ranking down a bit, they were punished for expressing liberal progressive views, not for conservative speech.”
And although liberal students felt more comfortable expressing themselves, IU ranked 132nd among colleges nationwide for tolerance of liberal views versus 78th for tolerance of conservative views. Purdue was ranked 105th and 35th respectively. As an organization, FIRE advocates for tolerance of speech across the political spectrum.
“If they're tolerant of offensive conservative speech, it's kind of hard to make the case that they're being hostile,” Stevens said.
FIRE’s Lead Counsel for Government Affairs Tyler Coward said that while the Foundation approves of aspects of SB 202 – notably protections for faculty who speak on politics outside of the classroom – it disapproves of provisions on tenure.
“This bill just goes too far in regulating academic instruction and contains vague standards for faculty evaluation that administrators or departments could too easily abuse,” he said.
Stevens agreed with Deery that the perceptions of conservative students is an issue, but he said it doesn’t indicate systemic bias.
“The psychological perception is real,” he said. “That doesn't necessarily mean it's true.”
Stevens said that rather than targeting professors’ speech, universities could model more tolerant administrative behavior and teach First Amendment modules to incoming students, as Purdue has.
“But at the end of the day, we still don’t know if that would necessarily work,” Stevens said. “I do think in research, it is oftentimes easier to diagnose things that are wrong than to come up with ways to fix it.”
