A message from University leadership: supporting our vibrant culture of spirited debate
In a campus message, Chancellor Lee H. Roberts and Provost J. Christopher Clemens provided an overview of and shared resources on free speech at Carolina.
Dear Carolina Community,
One of Carolina’s great strengths is our vibrant culture of robust and spirited debate. We know that every member of the Carolina community — students, faculty and staff — contributes to that culture by engaging with each other, sharing and testing their views and navigating complicated conversations about the great issues of the day.
We also know that friction and tension are inevitable when people who have different experiences, ideas and viewpoints live and work together. As a nation, we have spent decades questioning and deliberating how best to put First Amendment rights into practice. The purpose of this great public University, the nation’s first, is to provide a forum where ideas can be stated and challenged, weighed and evaluated. For that to work, we must all have the freedom to exchange these ideas without compromising the safety of our fellow community members and disrupting the operations of the University.
On this we want to be clear: No one person’s freedom of expression is more important than another person’s right to learn, work or speak free from harassment and discrimination. Civic engagement and peaceful protest have a long and noble history on our campus. No one has the right, however, to disrupt campus operations, threaten or abuse others or damage public property. Be assured that we will consistently apply our policies to everyone, regardless of content or viewpoint, so that Carolina remains a steadfast supporter of free speech while fulfilling our mission of teaching, research and service to the state and society.
To ensure that the campus community is aware of our policies and resources around speech, when and how the University will express a point of view and options for organizing events and speakers, we encourage you to visit a new website that will be updated regularly. We welcome your input on how we can be as timely and transparent as possible with this information to ensure clarity during what we expect will be an active semester.
There will be many opportunities this year to debate and demonstrate. As you do so, we ask that you do so with enthusiasm and respect for the principles of free expression that have been dear to this University for so many years.
Thank you for making Carolina a place where all voices are heard and valued.
Sincerely,
Lee H. Roberts
Chancellor
J. Christopher Clemens
Provost
