SU receives ‘D-’ in 2025 campus free speech rankings
Syracuse University received a D- score on the 2025 College Free Speech Rankings, a yearly assessment of free speech on campus. Zabdyl Koffa | Contributing Photographer
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Syracuse University scored a D- on a yearly assessment of students’ experiences regarding free speech expression on their college campuses.
The results of the 2025 College Free Speech Rankings, released Monday, scored SU 60.6 out of 100, a 4.9 point improvement from last year, with an overall rank of 76 out of the 257 college campuses surveyed.
SU had three reported speech controversies, compared to a reported zero from 2024.
SU’s rank rose 170 places from 2024, a jump that comes from shrinking speech controversy penalties, improvements to students’ understanding of free expression and adopting the “Chicago Statement” and institutional neutrality, according to the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, which published the rankings.
The “Syracuse Statement,” SU’s vow to free speech policy, was adopted from the University of Chicago and showcases institutions’ commitment to free expression for all students and faculty, the College Free Speech Rankings’ website states.
“Syracuse University unequivocally affirms its commitment to free expression and free inquiry. Learning from a diversity of viewpoints, and from the rigorous deliberation, debate, and dissent that accompany them, is an essential ingredient of academic excellence,” SU’s statement on free expression states.
SU scored higher on survey scores, ranking 33rd in students’ comfort in expressing themselves on controversial topics and 39th in “openness,” which describes how difficult it feels for students to discuss contentious issues, FIRE Director of Research Ryne Weiss said in a Tuesday statement to The Daily Orange.
The university’s rankings are an improvement from last year, when SU didn’t make the top 50 rankings of any survey component.
The university benefited from expired penalties for incidents in its Students Under Fire and Scholars Under Fire databases that had decreased rankings, Weiss said in the statement.
SU’s score is still penalized for three “deplatforming” incidents from 2023, but has had no new notable incidents since, Weiss said.
The ranking also shows 44% of SU respondents claim to have “self-censored” on campus within the past month. It also says 38% of students claim violence is an acceptable way to stop someone from speaking and 67% believe shouting at someone is acceptable to stop someone from speaking.
SU has a ratio of 4.58 liberal students to every one conservative student on campus, the survey states.
Claremont McKenna College, Purdue University and University of Chicago had the highest rankings of the assessed schools. The lowest ranking schools were Barnard College, Columbia University and Indiana University, according to College Free Speech Rankings’ website.
“Things still aren’t perfect — Syracuse still does not rank well in tolerance of controversial liberal or conservative speakers, and it still doesn’t earn our highest ‘green light’ rating for speech policies,” Weiss wrote. “But the improvements, not just in the rankings, but in policies and student perceptions, are something to be celebrated.”
