Editor's Note: (David M. Perry is an associate professor of history at Dominican University in Illinois. He writes regularly at his blog: How Did We Get Into This Mess? Follow him on Twitter. The opinions expressed in this commentary are his.)
(CNN) Despite the many highly publicized campus shootings in 2015, the elected legislators of Texas have decided to put more guns on campus. They passed Senate Bill 11. The bill doesn't go into effect until next August, but education itself is already a casualty.
The University of Houston, a school of over 43,000 students, is currently trying to figure out how to implement the bill while maintaining its academic mission. It doesn't seem to be working. Over the last few weeks, Dr. Jonathan Snow, geochemistry professor and president of the faculty senate at Houston, has been sharing a slideshow at faculty forums in order to advise his colleagues how to keep themselves safe by adjusting their teaching.
One slide in particular has been getting lots of attention over social media and in the press. It reads:
"You may want to
• Be careful discussing sensitive topics.
• Drop certain topics from your curriculum
• Not "go there" if you sense anger.
• Limit student access off hours.
• Go to appointment-only office hours
• Only meet 'that student' in controlled circumstances"
Overall, the slides urge faculty to persuade students to leave their guns at home, if possible, offering rhetorical advice on how to do so without violating the law or making anyone angry. Still, the likelihood is that some students will choose to bring concealed weapons anyway, so faculty must be ready.
Every one of these bullet points conflicts with basic principles of what makes education work. As a teacher, my job is to raise difficult topics, push students to think about topics in new ways, and to assess their work, even if that process can sometimes be uncomfortable.
This is not just true in the classroom. One of the things that makes a college campus special is the way students and faculty interact generally, whether through long drop-in conversations in office hours, contact at social events or in cafeterias, or otherwise partaking in the unquantifiable, but very real, benefits of shared community.
In fact, the University of Houston uses engagement as a metric with which to measure student success. Now, professors are being advised to stick to uncontroversial topics and to limit their physical access to students.
It's important to be clear that this distressing advice is not the fault of the faculty senate. What else can they do but try to help their faculty members be as safe and law-abiding as possible? The costs of following this advice, though, are very real.
Shooting at Oregon community college
Community members attend a candlelight vigil at Stewart Park for those killed during a shooting at Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, Oregon, on Thursday, October 1. The massacre left nine people dead and nine wounded. The gunman also died.
In response to the shooting on October 1, President Barack Obama delivers the 15th statement of his presidency addressing gun violence. "Somehow this has become routine," he said. "The reporting is routine. My response here at this podium ends up being routine, the conversation in the aftermath of it. We've become numb to this."
Students and faculty are reunited with friends and family at the county fairgrounds on October 1.
People wait for information at the fairgrounds on October 1.
Hannah Miles, center, is reunited with her sister Hailey and father, Gary, on October 1.
A student waits to walk off a school bus at the fairgrounds on October 1.
Friends and family are reunited on October 1.
A woman is comforted after the deadly shooting at Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, Oregon, on October 1. Douglas County Sheriff John Hanlin announced at a news conference that the shooter was dead.
Authorities secure the campus after the shooting on October 1.
Students, staff and faculty leave the school on October 1.
A bullet casing is marked at the scene of the shooting on October 1.
People gather at a roadblock near the entrance to the college on October 1.
Authorities respond after reports of the shooting on October 1.
Police search students outside the school on October 1.
A patient is wheeled into the emergency room at Mercy Medical Center in Roseburg on October 1.
I can't really imagine how I would teach in such a situation. I teach the history of the Crusades, about gender and violence, disability and discrimination, and many other difficult subjects. I give plenty of "As," but I also give plenty of "Fs." Students find some topics upsetting.
Students find bad grades upsetting. I couldn't be a good teacher in a context where I was forced to fear armed students. Even worse, speaking as an educator, I try to foster fervent, but respectful, debate among my students. They learn better from each other than from me. Would that kind of contact among peers even be possible if a student fears their classmate might be carrying?
In the end, this is a question of free speech. There's been a lot of talk about speech rights on campus over the past few years, as pundits, politicians, and professors have argued about trigger warnings or demands for more politically correct speech. People worried about liberal students argue that if we coddle them, if we don't expose them to disturbing ideas, they won't learn anything.
I am not worried about trigger warnings. It's the literal triggers attached to firearms that represent the real threat not only to free speech on campus, but to educational mission of our great public universities and colleges. Soon, only students who can afford to go to private schools, which are allowed to opt out of this bill, will be able to do so without fear of armed classmates.
Worst mass shootings in the United States
Parents wait for news after a shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, on Wednesday, February 14.
At least 17 people were killed at the school, Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel said. The suspect, 19-year-old former student Nikolas Cruz, is in custody, the sheriff said. The sheriff said he was expelled for unspecified disciplinary reasons.
Investigators at the scene of a mass shooting at the First Baptist Church in Sutherland Springs, Texas, on Sunday, November 5, 2017.
A man opened fire inside the small community church, killing at least 25 people and an unborn child. The gunman, 26-year-old Devin Patrick Kelley, was found dead in his vehicle. He was shot in the leg and torso by an armed citizen, and he had a self-inflicted gunshot to the head, authorities said.
A couple huddles after shots rang out at a country music festival on the Las Vegas Strip on Sunday, October 1, 2017. At least 58 people were killed and almost 500 were injured when
a gunman opened fire on the crowd. Police said the gunman, 64-year-old Stephen Paddock, fired from the Mandalay Bay hotel, several hundred feet southwest of the concert grounds. He was found dead in his hotel room, and authorities believe he killed himself and that he acted alone. It is the deadliest mass shooting in modern US history.
Police direct family members away from the scene of a shooting at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando in June 2016. Omar Mateen, 29,
opened fire inside the club, killing at least 49 people and injuring more than 50. Police fatally shot Mateen during an operation to free hostages that officials say he was holding at the club.
In December 2015,
two shooters killed 14 people and injured 21 at the Inland Regional Center in San Bernardino, California, where employees with the county health department were attending a holiday event. The shooters, Syed Rizwan Farook and his wife Tashfeen Malik, were later killed in a shootout with authorities. The pair were found to be radicalized extremists who planned the shootings as a terror attack, investigators said.
Police search students outside Umpqua Community College after
a deadly shooting at the school in Roseburg, Oregon, in October 2015. Nine people were killed and at least nine were injured, police said. The gunman, Chris Harper-Mercer, committed suicide after exchanging gunfire with officers, a sheriff said.
A man kneels across the street from the historic Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina,
following a shooting in June 2015. Police say the suspect, Dylann Roof, opened fire inside the church, killing nine people. According to police, Roof confessed and told investigators he wanted to start a race war.
He was eventually convicted of murder and hate crimes, and a jury recommended the death penalty.
Police officers walk on a rooftop at the Washington Navy Yard after a
shooting rampage in the nation's capital in September 2013. At least 12 people and suspect Aaron Alexis were killed, according to authorities.
Connecticut State Police evacuate
Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, in December 2012. Adam Lanza opened fire in the school, killing 20 children and six adults before killing himself. Police said he also shot and killed his mother in her Newtown home.
James Holmes pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity to a July 2012 shooting at a movie theater in Aurora, Colorado. Twelve people were killed and dozens were wounded when Holmes opened fire during the midnight premiere of "The Dark Knight Rises." He was sentenced to 12 life terms plus thousands of years in prison.
A military jury convicted Army Maj.
Nidal Hasan of 13 counts of premeditated murder for a November 2009 shooting rampage at Fort Hood, Texas. Thirteen people died and 32 were injured.
Jiverly Wong shot and killed 13 people at the American Civic Association in Binghamton, New York, before turning the gun on himself in April 2009, police said. Four other people were injured at the
immigration center shooting. Wong had been taking English classes at the center.
Pallbearers carry a casket of one of
Michael McLendon's 10 victims. McLendon shot and killed his mother in her Kingston, Alabama, home, before shooting his aunt, uncle, grandparents and five more people. He shot and killed himself in Samson, Alabama, in March 2009.
Virginia Tech student Seung-Hui Cho went on a shooting spree on the school's campus in April 2007. Cho killed two people at the West Ambler Johnston dormitory and, after chaining the doors closed, killed another 30 at Norris Hall, home to the Engineering Science and Mechanics Department. He wounded an additional 17 people before killing himself.
Mark Barton walked into two Atlanta trading firms and fired shots in July 1999, leaving nine dead and 13 wounded, police said. Hours later, police found Barton at a gas station in Acworth, Georgia, where he pulled a gun and killed himself. The day before, Barton had bludgeoned his wife and his two children in their Stockbridge, Georgia, apartment, police said.
Eric Harris, left, and Dylan Klebold brought guns and bombs to
Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado, in April 1999. The students gunned down 13 and wounded 23 before killing themselves.
In October 1991,
George Hennard crashed his pickup through the plate-glass window of Luby's Cafeteria in Killeen, Texas, before shooting 23 people and committing suicide.
James Huberty shot and killed 21 people, including children, at a McDonald's in San Ysidro, California, in July 1984. A police sharpshooter killed Huberty an hour after the rampage began.
Prison guard George Banks is led through the Luzerne County courthouse in 1985. Banks killed 13 people, including five of his children, in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, in September 1982. He was sentenced to death in 1993 and received a stay of execution in 2004. His death sentence was overturned in 2010.
Officers in Austin, Texas, carry victims across the University of Texas campus after Charles Joseph Whitman opened fire from the school's tower, killing 16 people and wounding 30 in 1966. Police officers shot and killed Whitman, who had killed his mother and wife earlier in the day.
Howard Unruh, a World War II veteran, shot and killed 13 of his neighbors in Camden, New Jersey, in 1949. Unruh barricaded himself in his house after the shooting. Police overpowered him the next day. He was ruled criminally insane and committed to a state mental institution.
Texas is not alone. Over the last few years, eight states have officially told public universities to permit concealed firearms on campus. The Georgia House passed a campus carry bill earlier this week. Ten other states have bills pending.
By chance, the Republican candidates for president are coming to the University of Houston for their next debate on CNN on Thursday evening. They are all strong supporters of the Second Amendment, but they should pause to listen to Jonathan Snow's warnings. He recently told his Board of Regents (as recorded on video), "This is not political."
He cited famed conservative Kenneth Starr, now president of nearby Baylor, a private school. Starr is pro-gun, but has come out against campus carry. Snow said, "Academics know that the intrusion of gun culture into campus inevitably harms the academic enterprise."
Universities do need to develop appropriate partnerships with trained, armed, uniformed, law enforcement. Big schools will have their police departments. Little schools may be able to rely on local cops. Security on campus matters.
But we can't teach or learn if we are afraid of each other. We cannot arm our way out of this crisis.
Join us on Facebook.com/CNNOpinion.
Read CNNOpinion's Flipboard magazine.