Campus Policy Battle over Free Speech Zones Ends

Janine Camara

Posted: 4/4/06

Freedom of expression has been synonymous with college and university settings in America for almost half a century. The heritage of college protest finds its roots in demonstrations at Howard University where late Black Panther Stokley Carmichael attended school, Columbia University where students protested against the Vietnam War and now at UNCG where students last November and this past January demonstrated against university policy.

During Mid-November of last year, Allison Jaynes, head of UNCG's College Libertarians, organized a peaceful protest consisting of about 40 people on the lawn of Jackson Library. The organization was assembled in dissent against the university's Facility Use Policy, which detailed that outdoor assemblies by affiliated or unaffiliated groups must convene in two "free speech and assembly areas," located on the east lawns of the Elliot University Center and the Foust Building. The College Libertarians founded their protest on their belief that protest zoning is repressive.

"We felt that [university policy] [was] unduly restrictive, especially compared to other colleges and universities around the country," said Jaynes. She and fellow UNCG student Robert Sinnott were charged with Student conduct code violations after refusing to leave the protest area. Their charges were dropped on January 13, 2006 after the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE), a civil rights organization that protects the rights of students on college campuses, became involved and wrote to Chancellor Sullivan and University Counsel.

On November 14, 2005, two days before the protest, school officials began reviewing the Facility Use Policy. This came after University Counsel Lucien "Skip" Capone notified the Chancellor in September of a recent legal decision at the Univeristy of Maryland that raised questions about the policy. Capone and other university officials, as well as students Ryan Radford and Matt Hill Comer were part of a task force formed by the Chancellor to modify the policy.

"The primary difference is that under the old policy if students wanted to have an assembly they needed to go to the designated areas and notify the Director of Student Life…now they don't. The only thing they have to do is notify the police 12 hours ahead of time," said Capone.

The old policy also required students to produce written notification to the Office of Student Life if they wanted to protest somewhere besides the established Free Speech zones. The new policy was approved by the Chancellor two weeks ago.

"I did it more-so for other students," said Comer of his involvement with the taskforce. "I do feel strongly that free speech should be honored and never abridged, and I'm just glad that the university now has a policy that is going to be a good balance by the way student's right to assemble and another student's right to receive an education," continued Comer.

On January 26, 2006, the College Libertarians joined forces with the College Republicans and College Democrats to protest University Policy again.

"We were simply out there to show that groups of different ideological leanings could come together for a common cause…I think we'll see more diversity of groups coming out to express themselves," said Jaynes of the policy change.