The Cornell Committee on Expressive Activity (CCEA) issued its Final Report on December 18 that was shared in an email from Chair Colleen Barry to all students, faculty and staff. Former President Martha Pollack had appointed the CCEA after the January 2024 Interim Expressive Activity Policy.drew criticism as excessively strict in regulating protests and other activities. Both the Student Assembly and the Faculty Senate passed critical resolutions. The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE) also sent in a letter sharing concerns.
Ordinarily, such policy documents would be developed by the Faculty Senate who has jurisdiction over Academic Freedom or the University Assembly (U.A.) which has jurisdiction over “common standards of conduct,” The UA was not consulted prior to President Pollack issuing the Interim policy, and the Student Assembly, the Faculty Senate and the UA had repeated debate airing disapproval of the policy and the bypassing of the shared governance bodies. So, the CCEA was appointed to work over the summer to develop something more reasonable.
The CCEA issued a draft report on October 30 and took comments at a December 3 hearing. Over 490 written comments were filed by December 9. The CCEA acted quickly and issued their final report ten days later.
Interim Suspensions
A major flaw in the Interim Policy was the lack of procedures to adjudicate violations of the policy. In particular, Day Hall adopted a graduated series of interim suspension pending a formal hearing with due process rights. Because the Office of Student Conduct and Community Standards has become notorious for dragging out interim suspension for as much as a year, several comments advocated limiting interim suspensions to 45-days.
The Heterodox Academy, a Cornell group that advocates for free expression, filed written comments. Prof. Randy O. Wayne said on behalf of the group:
“The Heterodox Academy asked for five improvements. We are pleased that the Committee dropped the restrictions on spontaneous demonstrations. However, the Committee did not address our proposal for a 45-day time limit on interim suspensions and other flaws in adjudicating alleged violators of the policy. We appreciate the hard work of the Committee, but hope that all further steps will be conducted in an open and transparent manner.”
The CCEA did not adopt that recommendation. Instead, the final report says:
“The committee supports use of the normal Student Code of Conduct Procedures with full due process protections in all cases except when temporary suspensions are warranted as described above. However, we are dismayed to learn that the normal disciplinary process often takes four to six months or longer to complete. To avoid such prolonged uncertainty for students, we recommend the university and the OSCCS explore opportunities within current Student Code of Conduct Procedures to reduce significantly the time from initiation to completion, including the possible need for additional staffing resources. Alternatively, the university could consider modifying the Student Code of Conduct Procedures to allow for full due process on a more efficient timeline to support timely adjudication for students.”
Spontaneous Demonstrations
FIRE filed written comments with the CCEA. FIRE Program Officer, Ross Marchand reacted to the final report:
“This latest iteration of the policy encourages, but does not require, expressive activities to be scheduled in advance through the 25Live reservation system. This marks a significant improvement from the previous, October 30 version of the policy, which required the pre-scheduling of expressive activities. While the previous version of the policy allowed for “spontaneous protests and demonstrations,” this activity was limited to Ho Plaza. As FIRE noted in its November 25 comment letter to the Committee, this area is a small part of campus, measuring approximately 1 acre compared to the Ithaca campus’ total size of 745 acres. The new policy cures this defect and eliminates the need for this “spontaneous protest” carve-out by ending the reservation requirement.”
However, the final report limits the right to spontaneously demonstrate is limited in special areas such as areas that provide services to the community such as law clinics or the Vet Hospital, living spaces, and libraries.
Posters and Signs
Ross Marchard also praised the final report for allowing more posters and signs:
“In addition, this December 18 policy preserves the right for Cornell community members to put up postings and signage without having to identify themselves on the material. No permission is required to post materials within designated areas. While these provisions were also in the October 30 version of the policy, the initial, March 11 interim policy required identification on postings and implored community members to “[c]ontact the applicable building coordinator or campus facilities director to find out the locations of designated postering areas.” This effectively operated as a prior restraint, or a restriction on speech before it happens. According to the Committee’s memo discussing the most recent round of policy changes, several commenters called for required identification on postings. The Committee laudably rejected those proposals, allowing continued anonymity.”
Harassment
The Oct 30 draft suggested that harassment be tied to targets who are members of disadvantaged identity groups, but the final report makes harassment prohibitions protective of everyone. Several comments including FIRE and Cornellians United for Free Speech claimed that the Oct. 30 draft misstated the standard to be used for harassment. In order to protect the First Amendment rights of people accused of harassment, they advocated for using the standard in the Supreme Court case of Davis v. Monroe County Board of Education. The alleged harassment must be severe, persistent and objectively offensive. The Oct. 30 draft said “or” rather than “and.” The final report sidestepped the issue by quoting the Biden Administration’s website for the Dept. of Education Office of Civil Rights which is litigating this issue.
Institutional Neutrality
Interim President Kotlikoff and Interim Provost Siliciano have already announced that they will refrain from issuing statements or taking positions on the issues of the day during their terms. Meanwhile, most of the campus protests have focused upon getting the university to take positions on issues such as the war in Gaza. Yet, policies at other universities, such as the University of Chicago’s Kalven Report, restrain both the President and individual units from taking such positions. On December 20, the President of Dartmouth wrote in the Wall Street Journal nat institutional neutrality must be “bottom-up” and include all departments and units. The CCEA recommends that Cornell appoint another group to draft a separate policy.
Next Steps
The final report says that the CCEA recommendations “were submitted to university
leadership for consideration on December 18, 2024.”
There are major disagreements over who will get the next move on the policy document. As noted above, there are strong arguments for the UA or the Faculty Senate to further improve the policy. However, Day Hall has claimed that the policy will now go to the Policy Committee for further refinement. One drawback is that Ryan Lombardi, VP for Student and Campus Life is a member of that Committee, and he usually looks out for student rights in that role. However, VP Lombardi will be on sabbatical for the Spring term.
Both the Heterodox Academy and Cornellians United for Free Speech argued that the document is really Cornell’s Rules for Maintenance of Public Order. If that is the case, then the Henderson Law requires that the Trustees also adopt the policy document.
