Over the past year, protests have roiled, and at times shut down, America’s college campuses.
Student groups with distinct political and cultural viewpoints have clashed, finding ever new ways to antagonize each other.
And outside agitators from left and right have attempted to capitalize on the divide.
Higher education leaders have struggled to communicate with students seeking ways to advocate for changes in local and state policy, critique international conflicts and change operations at their colleges and universities.
At the University of Utah, the Bennion Center for Community Engagement has hired Josh Shulruff, Campus Dialogue Program manager, to venture where others fear to tread.
“After experiencing many conflicts on campus last year, it became clear that more support regarding constructive dialogue was needed on our campus,” said Jason Ramirez, dean of students.
Josh Shulruff
Shulruff comes to the U from James Madison University, where he worked for eight years at the university’s Community Engagement and Volunteer Center, helping students learn how to engage in advocacy—write letters to members of Congress, organize their communities and participate in service. The experience, he said, helped him understand the strong sense of social justice and inclination toward advocacy that motivated many college students today. Their passion coincides with a point in U.S. history defined by political division and displacement.
“This feels cliché saying it, but I think we’re at a moment of crisis in our democracy,” Shulruff said. “That crisis has reflected in a lot of our institutions, including higher education. And I think that universities in some ways are best positioned to do something about it.
“I want my efforts to be focused on making our democracy function a little better,” he added. “I believe the leadership and skills students learn will ripple out in a way that will make our democracy healthier.”
Shulruff’s role coincides with other efforts to encourage lawful free expression on campus, including President Taylor Randall’s Viewpoint Representation and Expression Task Force, Student Affairs’ work with the Constructive Dialogue Institute and a new set of online training available to campus community members this fall called “Perspectives.”
“Free speech and all legal expressions of diverse viewpoints are part of our educational mission,” Ramirez added. “By creating this role, and pairing it with efforts to support and protect free expression, I believe we are taking a step toward further supporting our community's right to speech, demonstration, and activism.”
We asked Shulruff about how he will approach student groups exercising their free speech rights on campus.