Yesterday morning, Brandeis was named one of ten educational institutions on the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education’s list of the Ten Worst Colleges for Free Speech in 2014.

FIRE published the list in a Huffington Post article online and released it in a press release as well. Other institutions included in the list are California State University, Fullerton; Chicago State University; Georgetown University; University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; University of Iowa; Marquette University; Modesto Junior College; Kansas Board of Regents and the U.S. Department of Education. This year’s list is the fourth that FIRE has released annually.

“More than half of America’s top colleges maintain speech codes that blatantly violate First Amendment standards,” the press release reads, claiming that FIRE “takes a closer look at the previous year’s incidents of college censorship to determine the nation’s 10 worst abusers of student and faculty free speech rights.”

The Huffington Post article, written by FIRE’s President, Greg Lukianoff, lists the ten institutions and includes a short blurb about each, indicating why it made the list.

“You could be forgiven for assuming at first blush that Brandeis University is a haven for free speech, given its namesake’s contribution to First Amendment law,” the blurb about Brandeis reads “But beneath that façade is an environment that has been so hostile to free speech that Brandeis University’s reappearance on our list was a foregone conclusion.”

Lukianoff cites several episodes at the University that have made their way into the national media’s interest over the past year—including Prof. Donald Hindley’s (POL) retirement after comments he made on the “Concerned” listserv had been publicized, last spring’s rescinding of an honorary degree to Ayaan Hirsi Ali and two episodes involving Daniel Mael ’15.

—Rachel Hughes