Guns on Campus

Public colleges in the state have drafted policies on how to put into effect the law, which allows concealed handguns to be carried on campuses by nearly anyone over 21.

Under the new law, offices can be declared gun-free only if they’re single-occupancy. That leaves out most graduate students, so some are turning to other spaces where guns remain off-limits.

Concealed handguns are now legal in public-college classrooms in Texas. On the first day of classes at the University of Texas at Austin since the law took effect, opponents and supporters expressed their views with signs, slogans, and sex toys.

The national gun-rights organization has grown significantly since its inception on social media almost a decade ago.

Professors at Texas A&M University can bar firearms if they make a compelling case. But so far, there’s no evidence that any such requests have been answered.

The communication strategies for those institutions take on added urgency now that “campus carry” is law and students will start coming back for the new academic year.

As campus carry becomes legal in Texas and active-shooter scenarios loom in the public consciousness, security officials are grappling with costs both big and small.

Faculty members in some states prepare for new laws that will allow concealed weapons in their classrooms.

A historian facing active-shooter defense training resents how the burden of violence is being placed on educators.

A PowerPoint slide that circulated last week stirred fears that the presence of guns in Texas classrooms could cause professors to avoid sensitive subjects.

Nearly nine years ago, Colin Goddard was shot four times in a college classroom. Today, with the campus-carry debate raging, that experience helps shape his advocacy for gun-safety legislation.

An instructor wonders whether the likelihood of concealed guns in her classroom would make her go easy on certain students.

Students are scared of more shootings, an instructor writes. He’s not sure how to reassure them, but talking about it can only help.

While firing off a few rounds during target practice, Jerry Falwell Jr. explains that he never intended to be a spokesman for gun rights. But he is not backing down from his controversial remarks.

A panel at the University of Texas at Austin said guns should be allowed in such settings, in order to comply with a new state law expanding campus-carry at public universities.

This past week several campuses learned of online posts or bathroom-wall graffiti that threatened violence. Almost all of them went on high alert.

Gallows humor masks feelings of helplessness and anger as faculty members speculate on the grim probability of more classroom shootings.

The University of Texas at Austin is trying to comply with legislation that many people there fear will make the institution less safe.

People who fear the prospect of legal, concealed weapons on campuses are being just as irrational as those who refuse to leave the house unarmed.

A college professor in Georgia, where concealed weapons are about to be allowed on campuses, sees them as a fatal distraction.