John Martin, vice president for community relations and marketing at NIC, said the policy was created for safety reasons and to allow students to get to their classes. “The policy is to keep the campus safe and undisrupted when demonstrations are taking place. When Westboro Baptist Church visited us this last year we did not have a policy in place to say ‘OK, you’re welcome on our campus and we believe in the First Amendment right to free speech.’ However, we don’t believe groups that are demonstrating or exercising their right to free speech have the right to impede traffic or to disrupt classes or things of that nature”/Mitch Coffman, Idaho Reporter. More here.

Question: Was the NIC trustee decision to create a free-speech zone a reasonable response to the visit by Fred Phelps' Westboro Baptist Church in 2010 reasonable or overkill?