Free speech zones had been a staple of Western Michigan University’s speech codes long enough for YAL Chapter President Evan Oudekerk’s protests of them routine. Oudekerk and his fellow chapter members rolled out several giant free speech balls around the Michigan campus through the Fall semester of 2018, collecting petition signatures from students. These petitions called for WMU to adopt the “Chicago Principles” which ensure the broadest possible latitude to speak, write, listen, challenge, and learn” for students of an institution. I

Behind the strength of the petitions collected, Oudekerk approached a connection in Western Michigan’s administration to demand policy change. Oudekerk discovered that there had been discussion of changing the school’s student handbook to include a broader protection of free speech for students, but the changes had been held up by bureaucratic red tape and inaction. When presented with Oudekerk’s petitions and consistent follow-up, the administration shifted gears and changed the student handbook in the middle of the school year.

Based on the Western Michigan University YAL chapter’s commitment to action and overcoming bureaucratic objections, students of WMU now have written protection to speak and spread their ideas wherever is needed and without the permission of the school’s central bureaucracy–as the Constitution guarantees.