An Alabama college ranks among the nation’s best in supporting free speech on campus, according to a non-profit civil liberties group which specializes in protecting freedom of speech on college campuses.

The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), ranked more than 250 colleges across the U.S., using a survey of more than 55,000 students to compile a comprehensive comparison of student experiences on their respective campuses.

FIRE was founded in 1999 as the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education before rebranding in 2022 to reflect an expansion of its efforts beyond college campuses.

Although frequently portrayed as a right-leaning organization, with funding from conservative and libertarian groups, it also receives funding from more liberal donors including the Knight Foundation, the Hugh M. Hefner Foundation and Bloomberg Philanthropies, according to Politico.

The college free speech rankings, started in 2011, are based data collected between January and June 2023. The students surveyed were required to be enrolled full-time in four-year degree programs at one of a list of 254 colleges and universities in the U.S.

Students were queried in multiple categories, including:

• Comfort Expressing Ideas: How comfortable students feel expressing their views on controversial topics in different campus settings.
• Tolerance for Liberal or Conservative Speakers: Whether students supported the idea of speakers expressing views different from their own should be allowed on campus.
• Disruptive Conduct: How acceptable students found it to engage in different methods of protest against a campus speaker.
• Administrative Support: How clear is the campus administration’s policy on free speech and how likely would it be for the administration to defend a speaker’s right to express potentially controversial views.
• Openness: Students were asked about 20 issues, such as abortion, freedom of speech, gun control and racial inequality, and whether it was difficult to engage in open conversation on those topics on campus.

Once complete, the study found the Auburn University ranked second only to Michigan Technological University in supporting freedom of speech on campus. Auburn was one of only four schools nationwide which had a “speech climate” rated as “good” by FIRE.

Auburn was also the only one of the four schools earning that distinction which the survey found had a majority of students who have a conservative viewpoint, with 1.2 conservative students for every one liberal.

Other data from Auburn included:

• 59% of students say shouting down a speaker to prevent them from speaking on campus is at least rarely acceptable
• 48% say they have self-censored themselves on campus at least once or twice a month
• 53% say they are worried about damaging their reputation because someone misunderstands something they have said or done

Three other Alabama colleges were included in the rankings, with the University of Alabama-Birmingham (UAB) ranking 43rd and rated as “slightly above average” in supporting free speech.

At UAB:

• 62% of students surveyed said shouting down a speaker to prevent them from speaking on campus is at least rarely acceptable
• 55% said they have self-censored at on campus at least once or twice a month
• 51% said they are worried about damaging their reputation because someone misunderstands something they have said or done

The University of Alabama-Huntsville (UAH) earned an “average” rating and ranked 72nd. Survey data from UAH showed:

• 57% of students said shouting down a speaker to prevent them from speaking on campus is at least rarely acceptable.
• 48% say they have self-censored on campus at least once or twice a month.
• 54% say they are not worried about damaging their reputation because someone misunderstands something they have said or done.

The other Alabama college in the rankings was the University of Alabama. The Tuscaloosa campus earned a “below average” grade in its support of free speech and ranked 154th out of the 254 colleges rated. The survey findings found that:

• 51% of students on the Tuscaloosa campus say shouting down a speaker to prevent them from speaking on campus is at least rarely acceptable.
• 56% say they have self-censored on campus at least once or twice a month.
• 59% say they are worried about damaging their reputation because someone misunderstands something they have said or done.

Another interesting note is the survey found that, while conservative-leaning students outnumber liberals on the Auburn campus, the reverse is true at the other three Alabama schools included in the survey:

• At UAB, there are about 3.4 students who identify as liberal for every one conservative.
• At UAH, there are 2.2 liberal-leaning students for every one conservative
• At Alabama, there are 1.5 liberal-leaning students for every one conservative

While the Michigan Technological Institute took the top spot in the survey, Harvard University came in dead last, with the only school to be rated as “abysmal” for its free speech climate.

There were, however, six other colleges where the lack of support for free speech was deemed so poor they were excluded from the rankings, with FIRE writing that these schools have “prioritized other values over a commitment to freedom of speech.”

Those schools were:

• Hillsdale College in Hillsdale, Michigan
• Liberty University in Lynchburg, Virginia
• Pepperdine University in Malibu, California
• Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah
• Baylor University in Waco, Texas
• Saint Louis University in St. Louis, Missouri

All six of those schools are private and have religious affiliations.

The entire FIRE report can be found here.