BY: ANNIE BEG, ICAD INTERN
We often think of a college education as journey of personal development, academic exploration, and ideological diversity. However, that can be challenging when we don’t know how to engage with other with views different than our own.
This past fall, a series of student-led facilitations helped our campus explore the role of the First Amendment at James Madison University. While participants felt like the university provide students resources to vocalize their beliefs, there seems to be a foundational step missing: education. These conversations revealed that although students think Freedom of Speech is an important right, many were unaware of the range of First Amendment rights in a public university context specifically.
Integrated education is the first step to fostering a student body that is willing to take advantage of the resources and opportunities JMU provides for students to express their beliefs, and in turn, learn from others. Participants felt so strongly about the need for making students aware of their rights, that most of them said this should be incorporated in a mandatory freshman class or even a separate workshop.
The students who engaged in these deliberations about the first amendment felt that hearing from others gave them a richer lens through which to view the issue. This session gave students an experience of exploration across ideological diversity in a way that encouraged them to enrich their understanding through the opinions of others.
The image above is of Emerson Sykes, ACLU Attorney who recorded a session educating JMU students about first amendment rights on campus. To see the full video, click here: https://drive.google.com/drive/u/0/my-drive