FIRE welcomes Faculty Outreach Fellow Julia Schwarz

Julia Schwarz has joined FIRE as our new Faculty Outreach Fellow.

Based in our Washington, D.C. office, Julia will help plan FIRE’s annual faculty conference and expand our faculty network as part of FIRE’s Speech, Outreach, Advocacy, and Research (SOAR) initiative.

“We want faculty to know that FIRE is an organization that supports them if they’re trying to take a more active role on their campus,” Julia said.

Julia comes to FIRE from the American Political Science Association, where she worked closely with political science faculty on academic and professional development programs.  She also has a PhD in government from Georgetown University, where she was a teaching assistant.

After many years in a variety of roles in academia, she said she knows one thing for sure: “Faculty are crucial.”

“FIRE does great work with students, but faculty are often the ones who set the tone in the classroom and can bring students to an appreciation for things like due process and free speech. They have a lot of influence on students in a good way, and set the tone for campuses as well,” she said. “From a civil liberties standpoint, good faculty outreach gives professors more than just legal help when they need it. It’s also about giving faculty the resources they need to promote free speech on campus.”

As a longtime student and former instructor, she also knows the benefits of wide-ranging debate.

“Having conversations about ideas, even unpopular or controversial ones, forms the basis of a good education,” she said. “Not every university now is willing to defend faculty when they have these difficult conversations and not all students are getting access to this sort of debate. That’s why I’m really interested in what FIRE does and want to be a part of it.”

Please join us in welcoming Julia to FIRE!

And if you’re a faculty member and want to get in touch, email us at facultyoutreach@thefire.org.