A good way to get sued
Despite a law allowing carry on campus, a professor plans to ban guns from his class anyway:
One of the most famous professors at the University of Texas at Austin said this week that he plans to ban guns from his classroom, despite a new state law that will allow concealed weapons across campus, the Austin American-Statesman reported. The new law has already attracted lots of faculty opposition, but the pledge from Steven Weinberg, winner of the 1979 Nobel Prize in physics and the Jack S. Josey-Welch Foundation Chair in Science and Regental Professor at Austin, gives the cause new weight. That’s in part because critics of the law have said it could make it harder for Texas institutions to recruit and retain top professors. I will put it into my syllabus that the class is not open to students carrying guns, Weinberg said at a Faculty Council meeting, drawing sustained applause. I may wind up in court. Im willing to accept that possibility.
January 28th, 2016 at 6:38 pm
I don’t get it. How would he know? Does the student approach him, say “it’s the law” neener neener neener?
Just more feel-good nonsense.
January 28th, 2016 at 6:45 pm
Well, I took quick look at the Theory Group which he heads, but oddly he’s not listed as the professor of any classes.
Given his age, position and Nobel past, he probably doesn’t teach many classes and if any, only to upper grad students.
January 28th, 2016 at 6:52 pm
He’s just following Obama’s example: laws are just guidlines.
January 28th, 2016 at 10:02 pm
I’d hate for the Nobel Prize for Physics to be as devalued as the one for Peace.
January 28th, 2016 at 10:13 pm
It seems to me that any gun owner who wished to make some money could attend the good professor’s class, announce that he is in fact going to carry a concealed weapon, and then wait for the professor to take punitive action.
Student could then sue the professor AND his employer, thereby receiving piles of cash.
January 28th, 2016 at 11:50 pm
Bwa ha! My sister works in the same department as that old butthead.
January 28th, 2016 at 11:54 pm
This is exactly how I see this playing out.
Professor: “Guns are banned in my classroom.”
Student with gun: “So?” Walks in and sits down anyway.
January 29th, 2016 at 1:01 am
He thinks he cant be replaced, I think he will soon learn that everyone is replaceable.
January 29th, 2016 at 1:44 am
The university had better cover its behind post haste.
As Divemedic noted the lawsuit will produce piles of cash that will essentially give that student a fully paid ride.
Imagine putting in the syllabus that blacks, Jews, or any other group was not welcome in the class. The backlash should be severe against this hoplophobe.
January 29th, 2016 at 10:16 am
This is the whistle of a teapot full of hot water, and nothing more. My daughter just graduated from UT-Austin, and something like this, a political grandstanding stunt that makes the news, happens there about once a month on average. If it isn’t guns, its the statues of famous Texans (Confederates), the brutality of local police, the football team or coach self-destructing, the (imaginary) problem of 1in 5 women being raped on campus, the money the business school gets but the arts school doesn’t, and so on and so on.
If they didn’t whine so much they’d explode. Ignore it, whatever it is, it will be gone this time next week.
January 31st, 2016 at 3:52 pm
@ mikee:
The difference here is that complaining about removing statues, the football team, etc. are not violating Texas law. Infringing on a student’s legally defined right as set out in state statute is a violation of the law, and leaves the professor AND the university in the land of legal liability.