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More than a dozen college presidents have signed on to a new campaign to bolster free speech on their campuses. The 13 leaders — hailing from Cornell, Duke, Rutgers Universities, and Wellesley College, to name a few — are pledging to “urgently spotlight, uplift, and re-emphasize” free speech and academic freedom over the next academic year, they announced Tuesday. The presidents, who are planning what they call “urgent action,” are mostly from private colleges.

The presidents of a wide-ranging group of 13 universities are promoting free speech on their campuses this academic year, as part of a nonprofit initiative announced Tuesday to combat what organizers call dire threats to US democracy. The participating schools include the University of Notre Dame, a private Catholic research school, Benedict College, a historically Black school in South Carolina, Rollins College, a small liberal arts school in Florida, and Ivy League member Cornell University, which in April announced that freedom of expression would be the theme for its 2023 school year. The other schools are Claremont McKenna College, DePauw University, Duke University, James Madison University, the University of Pittsburgh, the University of Richmond, Rutgers University, Wellesley College, and Wesleyan University.