Americans are not optimistic about the state of higher education. A 2025 Pew Research survey revealed that 7 in 10 adults believe that higher education in the United States is generally going in the wrong direction. Forty-six percent say that colleges and universities do a fair or poor job of “providing opportunities for students to express their own opinions.” Forty-five percent negatively rate these institutions’ job of “exposing students to a wide range of opinions.”
On the ground, students engage in self-censorship out of fear of how their views will be received by both their professors and peers. Fear of engaging with ideological opponents and the resulting breakdown of communication are surely fueling polarization in our country.
Respectful conversation is a key ingredient to healing our civic culture.
Room for optimism exists, however. There is a steady growth in efforts to cultivate the civil exchange of ideas on campus. Take, for example, the class at Kalamazoo College that recently made headlines. Professor Justin Berry’s senior seminar on political polarization requires students to do the seemingly impossible: interview someone with very different views for 30 minutes to an hour. The results were unexpectedly fruitful. Despite covering points of disagreement, students reported surprise at finding how much they had in common with their interviewees. And the conversations sometimes went far beyond the required time limits, into “multiple sessions for multiple hours.” Students’ experiences in this class are a testament to what close listening and courteous communication can produce.
At UNC-Chapel Hill, the Courageous Conversations discussion led by Professor John Rose is another example of students’ eagerness to engage in substantive, but difficult, conversations. The discussion focused on the fairness of college admissions post-affirmative action, which formally lasted an hour. Students lingered afterward to continue the conversation in smaller groups.
The UNC story reminds me of a Braver Angels debate I attended at North Carolina State University (NCSU) in 2023. Braver Angels, an organization that helps moderate parliamentary-style debates, invited students to participate in a respectful debate on whether there should be restrictions on abortion. Students from the audience were welcome to take turns making their case at a podium for a set time period. I was impressed by the calm and respectful tone maintained throughout the debate, even though strongly opposing views were expressed. After the debate formally ended, students from both sides continued speaking with one another on the topic. This debate format gave students the tools they needed to meaningfully discuss one of the most polarizing issues in our national discourse.
These hopeful efforts need to become mainstream in higher education. The James G. Martin Center for Academic Renewal’s recently published Blueprint for Reform: Civil Discourse outlines actionable steps universities and states can take to strengthen civil dialogue.
The Martin Center recommends that universities:
- Create and support programs dedicated to civil discourse. These programs should organize regular public-policy debates on an array of issues.
- Institute and facilitate post-debate discussions within student residences.
- Adopt a statement, such as the Chicago Statement, clearly affirming the value of free speech and the civil and free exchange of ideas.
- Provide a user-friendly public calendar of scheduled campus debates.
- Adopt a position of institutional neutrality on current debated issues. This will help ensure that students, staff, and faculty can ask questions and express views without pressure to conform to an official institutional stance.
For their part, state legislatures should require their institutions to be homes of civil and open debate by passing legislation based on The Campus Intellectual Diversity Act.
Students are hungry for civil discourse. Universities must seize this moment to build ideological bridges on their campuses. Doing so may help turn the tide of public opinion and, most importantly, deepen students’ understanding of and empathy for their fellow citizens.
Shannon Watkins is Research and Policy Fellow at the James G. Martin Center for Academic Renewal.
