University of Washington, Tacoma

We formed this group to protect academic freedom and to resist what we see as a weakening commitment to free inquiry at UW Tacoma and the tri-campus UW as a whole.

UWT is a largely nonresidential, urban-serving, majority non-white university founded in 1990. Most of our students are nontraditional: more than half are first generation, more than 40% receive Pell grants, and 16% are affiliated with the military. Because many in our diverse student body are unfamiliar with certain longstanding foundations of higher learning that are now increasingly at risk, we want them to learn that a university keeps itself young and old at once if it follows a traditional mission: to pursue knowledge and truth by thinking openly, creatively, rigorously, and bravely; by challenging ideas in order to improve them; and by doing so with respect and gratitude for those with different views.

And we are optimistic. In our experience, UWT students arrive with open minds, showing minimal signs of orthodox thinking and even some ironic distance from it. By hosting events that model civil discourse about contentious topics, we hope to imbue in them a determination to preserve their openness as well as the courage to do so.