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Attorney Adam Goldstein has joined �鶹��ýIOS as a Justice Robert H. Jackson Legal Fellow after a 13-year career at the Student Press Law Center (SPLC).

“�鶹��ýIOS is one of very few groups that will defend the American free speech model on campus, no matter your politics. I am so, so proud to get to do that at �鶹��ýIOS,” Adam said. “Anyone who hasn’t been impressed with �鶹��ýIOS’s work hasn’t been paying attention.”

In his decade-plus at the SPLC, Adam provided legal assistance for more than 15,000 people and co-authored SPLC’s legal textbook, Law of the Student Press. A graduate of Fordham University School of Law and Fordham College at Lincoln Center, he has taught student media law for Michigan State University’s graduate school of education and advocated for domain name owners in arbitration. He blogs on First Amendment and civil rights issues on The Huffington Post.

The “higher calling” to defend student and faculty rights comes from a deep understanding of their importance.

“My mother is a first-generation immigrant who became a lawyer in the U.S. She left Eritrea, then Ethiopia, when students were being shot for their political opinions. When you talk to anyone who left a situation like that to become an American, you realize how unlikely our system of government was to develop, let alone succeed. And you understand that no ideology is more important than civil rights and respect for the individual.”

And that respect extends to opinions we may disagree with.

“As a society, we need critics,” he said. “We need people to offer competing ideas and help us find the flaws in our answers. Even loud, uncomfortable, or mean critics.”

He added: “Free speech is perhaps the best-tested theory of the last two hundred years. So far, it works really well.”

�鶹��ýIOS is excited to welcome Adam as the newest passionate free speech advocate to our team. Welcome, Adam!