November 3, 2015

The Department of Integrative Biology at The University of Texas at Austin opposes guns in classrooms, laboratories, and faculty offices. We believe that guns in educational and research spaces will impede learning, discovery, and intellectual freedom and thereby undermine the University’s mission to achieve excellence and advance society

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We the undersigned faculty members of the Department of Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering believe that, except for those carried by law enforcement personnel, guns should not be allowed in any building at the University of Texas at Austin. The first canon of the code of ethics of the American Society of Civil Engineers begins “Engineers shall hold paramount the safety, health and welfare of the public.” We believe that allowing guns in our classrooms, laboratories, and offices would be inconsistent with this canon. Further, we believe that allowing guns in campus buildings is contrary to the directive of the Constitution of the State of Texas that we should become a “university of the first class,” because it will make the retention and recruitment of excellent faculty and students more difficult. Continue reading Department of Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering →

The American Academy of Religion (AAR) is deeply concerned about the impact of Texas¹s new Campus Carry law as it relates to Texas universities.

The law, which was passed earlier this year, will take effect in 2016. It allows licensed handgun owners to bring concealed handguns into buildings, including classrooms, on Texas campuses. The law gives public universities some discretion to regulate campus carry but stipulates such regulations may not “generally prohibit” or “have the effect of generally prohibiting” those licensed from carrying concealed handguns.

The AAR believes that maintaining safe environments for free inquiry is vitally important to every classroom in higher education. As scholars of religion, we are especially sensitive to classroom security. The critical study of religion can be unsettling and uncomfortable: it often questions closely held beliefs and probes religious convictions.

The AAR believes that the Campus Carry law and similar laws in other states will compromise the safety of the spaces in which we teach, introduce new threats to college campuses, and result in harmful effects on students, professors, and the free expression of ideas. The AAR urges university leaders to consider classroom restrictions on campus carry to protect physical safety and safeguard academic freedom.

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We, the undersigned faculty and staff of the UT Austin School of Social Work, strongly oppose guns on campus. Social work is a field committed to social justice and to the health and wellbeing
of individuals, families, and communities. We work tirelessly to prevent violence and trauma, and all forms of oppression. As social scientists, we base our recommendations and interventions on rigorous scientific evidence. Research evidence is conclusive that concealed weapons do not reduce crime or violence. In fact, access to firearms increases the risk of violence and tragedies. We believe that permitting concealed weapons on campus will only create fear, intimidation, panic and harm. And because violence and intimidation are tools of social control, we stand in solidarity with other groups on our campus who are impacted disproportionately by violence including communities of color, women, individuals living with
disabilities and members of the LGBTQIA community. Accordingly, we join with our esteemed colleagues in other disciplines on campus and with the scientific community at large in strongly opposing the presence of guns on the UT campus. Continue reading School of Social Work Statement on Campus Carry →

Statement on Campus Carry
October 30, 2015

We, the faculty of the College of Pharmacy, state our strong opposition to concealed guns in University of Texas at Austin classrooms, laboratories, offices, and social spaces. Through teaching and research endeavors, our goal is to improve the health outcomes and quality of life of the people we serve, most notably the culturally diverse population of Texas. In accomplishing this goal, our ability to deliver the curriculum, and to recruit and retain outstanding and diverse faculty, staff and students, will be negatively impacted by the SB11 law allowing concealed weapons in campus buildings. Our mission is to improve public health and welfare, and gun violence, an established threat to public health, is counter to the mission of the College of Pharmacy. Continue reading College of Pharmacy opposition to Campus Carry →

The below-signed Chemical Engineering faculty, emeriti, and staff at The University of Texas at Austin oppose Senate Bill 11. We believe that guns in classrooms, laboratories, faculty/advising offices, and collaboration spaces would be unsafe and stifle the free exchange of ideas central to a world-class university. They may also pose threats in teaching and research laboratories where flammable and toxic chemicals are used, and thus their presence in these and adjacent
environments would be in opposition to our core educational mission regarding chemical process and laboratory safety. This is critical because engineers are educated and ethically bound to hold
paramount the safety, health, and welfare of the public. We also fear that Senate Bill 11 may damage our ability to recruit and retain the most capable students, faculty, and staff. Continue reading Chemical Engineering Faculty and Staff Statement →

Bruce Grube, PhD from the Government Department at UT, issued the following statement:

Having served as the president of two universities as well as being a UT Austin alumnus, I am more than familiar with the campus environment. Any law that permits firearms on a university campus can only be the consequence of the most profound ignorance, coupled with the inordinate influence of the NRA and its minions upon a submissive and thoughtless legislature and governor.  All of our elected officials who were involved in the passage of the campus carry law should be deeply ashamed.  The common good has not, and will not, be served by such a patently stupid piece of legislation.  I would encourage the UT administration to work diligently not only to repeal the legislation in the next session, but also to implement policies in the meantime that most strictly limit the effects of the law on the campus.   UT should be gun free!

Bruce Grube
President Emeritus
Georgia Southern University

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As supporters of the mission of The Center for Women’s & Gender Studies, we are fully aware of the sensitive and often controversial nature of the topics with which we engage on a daily basis. The possibility that an armed student (licensed or not) might be present in the classroom or in our Center will necessarily limit the topics we discuss and our willingness to engage students in controversial discussions.

We try to create a ‘safe space’ for students to speak about sensitive issues in their classrooms, in our offices and when they engage with our staff and with one another.  Guns can never, even in the hands of licensed carriers, promote or preserve that space. They can only carry threats of violence and intimidation.    Continue reading The Center for Women’s & Gender Studies →

Dear President Fenves,

The undersigned faculty of the Department of Linguistics strongly oppose the admitting of guns into our classrooms, our offices, our research labs, and students’ dormitories. We understand that Texas Senate Bill 11 authorizes the university administration to enact regulations regarding the carrying of concealed handguns on campus. Speaker of the Texas House Joe Straus recently stated publicly that SB11 gives university presidents “a lot of authority and flexibility to design a plan” [1].  We assume that you wish to enact a policy that will do the most to protect the safety of UT’s faculty, staff, students, and visitors.  Allowing  people to bring loaded handguns into our buildings will endanger those  people and the people around them.  We therefore call on the administration to exclude guns from the rooms on campus where we work and teach, and where our students live.

Our safety concerns are not restricted to the possibility of premeditated acts of violence, but also extend to negligent discharges, impulsive shootings, and coercion and intimidation by gun holders.  Reciprocal agreements with other states with less stringent concealed handgun licensing requirements than those of Texas will further increase the risks associated with weapons in the hands of unprepared civilians.  We submit that the presence of weapons on our campus will have a chilling effect on public debate and on the free exchange of ideas and perspectives, activities that are at the core of the university’s mission.

We believe that the presence of concealed weapons on our campus will damage our efforts to maintain the reputation of the University of Texas at Austin as a vital and respected research institution, as highly qualified students and faculty turn to universities in other states. The damage to the institution in which we have invested our careers will in turn reduce our capacity to advance knowledge and serve our citizens. As a faculty we will be more effective in training the future leaders and thinkers of the State of Texas in an environment in which students and teachers feel safe. We thus ask you to create an environment in which the wishes of the overwhelming majority of students, teachers and staff are respected, in which our work and living spaces are free of loaded deadly weapons.

[1] Joe Straus, quoted in ‘Straus Defends Conservative Record of House, by Morgan Smith.’ The Texas Tribune, Oct. 17, 2015. Continue reading Department of Linguistics on Campus Carry →