Harvard University is the nation’s worst higher education institution when it comes to valuing and promoting free speech, at least according to a recently released report that draws on responses from more than 58,000 students across 251 colleges and universities.

While the Israel-Hamas war and the subsequent student protest movement heightened tensions and impacted the expression of free speech on campuses across America, Harvard was particularly affected by high-profile controversies and clashes.

Harvard has consistently received poor marks in the annual College Free Speech Rankings from the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE) and College Pulse. It ranked dead last in both the 2023 and 2024 findings.

The climate of free speech at Harvard was slapped with an “abysmal” rating by FIRE. Of all the schools examined, only Harvard, Columbia University, and New York University received “abysmal” ratings. Harvard received a score of -21.58, which was rounded up to zero. For context, the top-scoring institution was the University of Virginia, which received an overall score of 73.41. 

The rankings are determined by a composite score that combines 14 different components. Half of these assess student perceptions of aspects of free speech, and the other seven components assess the behavior of administrators, faculty, and students regarding free expression. 

“It’s hard to tell whether Harvard students or administrators are more hostile to free speech,” FIRE Chief Research Advisor Sean Stevens said in a statement. “In the past year, students substantially disrupted two campus events and tried to disrupt three more, and the university canceled a speaking event by congressmen Jake Auchincloss and Ro Khanna days after Auchincloss criticized then-President Claudine Gay’s inconsistent defense of free speech.”

Gay resigned earlier this year after being subject to intense backlash over comments she made at a congressional hearing on campus antisemitism. When asked if calling for the genocide of Jews would violate Harvard’s code of conduct, Gay said that it would depend on the specific context. She also faced allegations of plagiarism. 

As the war in Gaza grew deadlier and pro-Palestinian student activists camped out on Harvard Common last spring, both they and pro-Israel factions of the student body said that their right to free speech was being stifled. 

Harvard was penalized in the free speech rankings for being home to four successful “speaker deplatformings” and four attempted disruptions of events, according to FIRE. The organization also dinged Harvard for suspending the Harvard Undergraduate Palestine Solidarity Committee for organizing a rally with multiple unrecognized groups to support student protesters at Columbia. 

Since 2020, FIRE has documented 20 “speech controversies” that resulted in a “deplatforming, a scholar sanction, a student sanction, or an attempted disruption of an event” at Harvard. 

The supposed repression of free speech on Harvard extended beyond the topics of Israel and Palestine. A total of 53% of students said that they had “self-censored” on campus at least once or twice a month. The survey found that 70% of students at Harvard believe “shouting down a speaker to prevent them from speaking on campus is at least rarely acceptable.”

Harvard’s page within the rankings included three anonymous student quotes.

“During a class about pregnancy, the teaching fellow allowed students to openly mock Christian anti-abortion stances. If I were to respond, or even say that protecting a human life is important, both the teaching fellow and students would have cried foul. I have learned that I am expected to take insults on the chin and say nothing. I dare not challenge a graduate student who chooses my grade,” one member of the Class of 2025 wrote. 

FIRE is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization that says it works to educate Americans about the importance of inalienable rights like free speech. College Pulse is a survey research and analytics company that partners with FIRE to compile feedback from students. The 2024 rankings were created using survey results from Jan. 25 through June 17. In-depth details about how the ranking system works can be found in a report released with the rankings. 

The highest-ranking Massachusetts school was Worcester Polytechnic Institute, which was ranked at No. 46. UMass Amherst was ranked at No. 106, MIT at No. 164, Northeastern at No. 178, and Tufts at No. 182. 

After the University of Virginia, the top-ranked schools nationwide were, in descending order, Michigan Technological University, Florida State University, Eastern Kentucky University, and the Georgia Institute of Technology. 

The full rankings can be found here.