UCI to lead free speech center

UC Irvine will oversee the University of California’s new center to promote free speech and civic engagement, the campus announced last week.

UC Irvine Chancellor Howard Gillman, a constitutional law scholar, also announced the center’s inaugural class of 10 fellows.

The scholars, students and analysts from across the country will explore such issues as the intersection of diversity and free speech, protests over police practices and challenges to safeguard the 1st Amendment amid today’s polarized politics.

Several fellows also plan to develop curricula and tool kits to help students better understand free speech issues.

“The first class of fellows exemplifies our goal of bringing together the country’s great minds to study the complicated issues of free speech, activism and civic engagement,” said Gillman, co-chair of the center’s advisory board.

Gillman told The Times in a recent interview that today’s students are not fragile “snowflakes” but need to better understand the importance of 1st Amendment freedoms. He recently cowrote a book, “Free Speech on Campus,” with Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of the UC Berkeley law school.

UC President Janet Napolitano announced plans for the new National Center for Free Speech and Civic Engagement last fall.

Gillman will organize a national conference on free speech this year and has launched a search for an executive director to run the center’s day-to-day operations from the UCDC center in Washington.

In recent years, UC campuses have been roiled by skirmishes over free speech involving controversial speakers. UC Berkeley recently disclosed that it spent nearly $4 million in security costs for a month of free speech events last year involving conservative commentator Ben Shapiro and far-right provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos.