DEI halted at North Carolina colleges as UNC bans compelled speech
Breccan F. Thies
North Carolina State University has stopped its plan to use diversity statements when considering faculty promotions and tenure.
A project of the NC State Faculty Senate to incorporate diversity, equity, and inclusion considerations was reportedly put on pause after a UNC Board of Governors decision earlier this year to ban compelled speech.
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The UNC Board of Governors oversees 16 institutions under the UNC system, including NC State.
“It is lamentable that it has taken an express prohibition by the UNC system to end these problems, but it’s cause for optimism that it is possible to reestablish a culture of free inquiry,” Parents Defending Education President and founder Nicole Neily told the Washington Examiner.
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In January, the Faculty Senate created a Special Select Subcommittee on Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging to advance the university’s goal to “champion a culture of equity, diversity, inclusion, belonging and well-being in all we do,” according to the school’s strategic plan.
A May email sent to faculty by the committee detailed plans to “align” promotion and tenure with goals in the strategic plan, “specifically” related to the diversity, equity, and inclusion push, accompanied by a survey.
However, that goal appeared to be at odds with the Board of Governors’s prohibition, which states the university shall not require employees or job applicants “to affirmatively ascribe to or opine about beliefs, affiliations, ideals, or principles regarding matters of contemporary political debate or social action” as a condition of employment.
A background memo outlining the Board of Governors policy explains that compelled speech could “function as litmus tests for adherence to prevailing socio-political views on various matters of contemporary political debate,” and the university seeks to encourage the “full freedom … inquiry, discourse, teaching, research, service, and publication.”
Faculty Senate subcommittee co-chairman Corey Johnson told the James G. Martin Center for Academic Renewal that the committee “never” sought to compel engagement or support for DEI or penalize faculty who do not wish to engage with it. He added that it will not adopt practices that violate the compelled speech policy.
Johnson could not be reached for comment, but in an auto-reply explaining that he is on vacation, the professor suggested an NPR podcast, saying, “If you are interested in how passive and active rest can help us resist capitalism, patriarchy, and white supremacy, might I suggest a listen.”
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“DEI statements, bias response teams, and expansive speech codes are expressly designed to chill speech and silence heterodox views,” Neily said. “Faculty and students at all levels, be it in a university setting or K-12 institutions, respond to policies like these because most people don’t seek out conflict or punishment.”
NC State, the Faculty Senate, and the UNC Board of Governors did not respond to a request for comment from the Washington Examiner.