Braum Katz is a student at the College of William and Mary and a 2007 FIRE intern. During his internship, he spent the summer actively participating in FIRE’s work and gained a thorough understanding of what sorts of policies distinguish a green light school from a yellow or red light school.

During that summer, Braum took a look at his college’s rating in FIRE’s Spotlight database and read about the various policies that were negatively impacting William and Mary’s ranking and making the college a red light school. He learned that FIRE has objected to William and Mary’s overbroad group, sexual and general harassment policies, their “bias reporting” policy, and a few other speech codes. He also spoke to various FIRE staffers about the policies to get a more in-depth feel of the sort of threat posed by these policies. Upon returning to his campus in the fall of 2007, Braum pledged to do whatever he could to take William and Mary from a red light to a green light school. (To see your school’s entry, visit the Spotlight webpage and use the clickable map on the right-hand sidebar or simply search for your schools name in the search box.)

One of the first things that Braum did after making this pledge was also one of the most important. Before considering his options for campus activism, Braum considered the environment of his campus. After some careful consideration, he decided that his campus and his college administration would be open to his suggestions and to working with him to make the campus safe for liberty. This is a crucial step for any student interested in becoming an activist for liberty on their campus. While a number of activist opportunities exist, even the best implemented campaigns can fail if they are not properly in tune with the campus environment. Some campuses might respond better to working with the administration, while others may not give you the opportunity.

After reviewing the campus climate, Braum decided to run a very open reform campaign. Working with the student government, he was chosen to be the first Student Assembly Undersecretary of Student Rights for Free Speech Advocacy. From that position, he had better access to college administrators and a more legitimate position from which to advocate for change. Working closely with other student senators, Braum formulated four distinct proposals which he hoped would correct the most glaring problems with campus policies. He then sent his proposals to the college president and other senior administrators. After taking a look at his materials, they promised to include them on their summer retreat agenda.

Along with providing suggestions for changes, Braum also attempted to garner some attention for his initiative among the student body. A member of an independent campus paper, Braum and his colleagues wrote several articles about the progress being made on revising the speech codes. He made sure to talk about specific objectionable areas in his campus’ speech codes that may not initially strike people as troublesome. For instance, in explaining his opposition to the sexual harassment policy as written, Braum said, “People have the right not to be harassed but we need to use the legal definition of harassment and not overstep our bounds.” Additionally, when explaining why William and Mary’s limits on where students can protest needed to be altered, he said, “I understand and support reasonable time, place and manner restrictions. People's education should not be interrupted. A rock concert outside a classroom interferes with people's learning. But we should make these restrictions as least restrictive as possible.” It is extremely important that you both highlight the most egregious parts of school policy that most people will agree should be changed and address head-on those areas that may be unconstitutional or illiberal but may not initially seem problematic to most people.

Braum provides an example of how students can work with their administrations to bring liberty-minded reform to their campuses.