Colleges have grown tired of only restricting the free-speech rights of students — their newest target is freedom of association.
Under the guise of ending “a system of privilege and oppression,” Northwestern University will require student groups to “begin admitting any interested students by next year or they will lose university funding,” according to Inside Higher Ed.
University administrators have become the new helicopter parents, enraged that the other kids won’t let their son play kickball during recess. That’s an outcome desired by some students; students are pushing for “inclusivity” that trumps the traditional prerogatives of campus groups to choose its members based on quality and merit.
That bodes ill for students who want to determine which students they will interact with in official capacities, or for media publications, activist groups, and religious groups that would require its members to hold certain beliefs.
Many restrictions on freedom of association have been justified in the name of gender equality, nondiscrimination, and other egalitarian arguments that run roughshod over the constitutionally protected student rights.
Colleges care more about social engineering than the individual liberty of their students.
At Harvard, the university will ban any members of “unrecognized single-gender social organizations” from holding leadership positions in any recognized student groups in an attempt to “advance our shared commitment to broadening opportunity” and fighting “forms of privilege and exclusion at odds with our deepest values,” according to President Drew G. Faust.
In 2014, Wesleyan University banned any fraternities that were not coeducational to “increase gender equity on campus.”
In 2012, Vanderbilt University began “to enforce a long-held nondiscrimination policy for student groups,” according to NPR, that required groups to “drop requirements that their leaders hold certain beliefs.” Many religious groups became unrecognized on campus because it would have required Christian groups to accept an atheist for its leadership positions, Muslim groups a Jewish leader, or anyone who didn’t share the faith of the religious organization based on “nondiscrimination.”
Some celebrate Harvard’s restrictions as a way to protect students against sexual assault, but the restrictions are a blunt instrument to fight criminal activity.
Ironically, those rules can be used to eliminate “safe spaces.” All-female organizations at Harvard have opposed the rule changes because they punish “female spaces” that students join for a “mental health respite” or a way to “assert their rights” and oppose marginalization.
At least for Northwestern students, some groups can earn an exemption.
“The policy would exclude some groups, however, such as Sexual Health and Assault Peer Educators, a student club that works with victims of sexual assault and thus requires a selective membership process,” Jake New wrote. “Fraternities and sororities, which are recognized by Northwestern but are independent from the university, would also not be subject to the new policy. Certain sports and performance clubs could receive exemptions, as well, on a case-by-case basis, the university said.”
Legally, students have no recourse against those colleges. Harvard, Northwestern, Vanderbilt, and Wesleyan are all private institutions, which can restrict the speech and association of their students more than public colleges. For those students who care about independent student groups, they’ll have to transfer to a public college.
