Student-Enforced Censorship at Pennsylvania's Private Colleges

At first glance, Pennsylvania doesn’t stand out in the second annual College Free Speech Rankings, the results of a survey of more than 37,000 students in 159 colleges. You won’t find any of the state’s colleges listed near the top of the rankings, alongside Claremont McKenna College, nor at the bottom, next to the two-time national worst DePauw University.

But on one particularly important metric—students’ level of comfort in expressing themselves—Pennsylvania’s schools stand out, and in a way that reveals a disturbing trend in America’s smaller university campuses.

By this measure, Haverford College, Bucknell University, and the University of Pennsylvania rank among the 10 campuses with the most reticent student populations nationally. Carnegie Mellon University isn’t far behind, ranking 18th on the list.