student expelled from UVAWise

[sup-rbeast]

Really, if you really have no grounds to search a student, you shouldn't do it. Especially over an assignment in creative writing. IMO, the college should have searched the entire campus, and then their finds would have been legit. But, let em search the campus every time they have an assignment turned in that disturbs a teacher or 2 and see how long folks stand for it. During my 3 years up there I was taught that an education in liberal arts was designed to teach student to be innovative, provocative, or in short, to think for themselves. Guess now it's to produce streamlined sheep. Whatever floats their boat I reckon.

[R0cketer]

Ok keep ignoring why this poor guy is a victim and the girl he mentions writing a paper is still in school. Stop trying to make it about the writing, the writing was the trigger, if that was all there was, he would be back in the school.

Even if charges didn't come from his previous incident, he was under probation, if he had the guns with no previous issues, he might still have gotten off, but when there is previous issues with a student, how many times do you say ooooh you're ok.

[sup-rbeast]

Dude, I know how biased the college is. I once got community service up there for putting a single beer bottle down the garbage chute....So I guess what you are saying is that all students up there who get drunk should be placed on probation with the school and therefore have less rights than the others?...Let em do it...I guess 99.9% of em start out on probation...so what's next?

[HokieFan]

Virginia attorney general defends colleges' choice to ban concealed weapons

Tuesday, Mar 18, 2008 - 12:00 AM

By Kathy Still
Staff Writer
Bristol Herald Courier
E-mail | Biography

Virginia's colleges have the right to prevent students ? even those with concealed-weapons permits ? from carrying firearms on campus if college rules prohibit them, the state's attorney general said here Monday.
Bob McDonnell visited with Appalachian School of Law students during a tour of Southwest Virginia. The attorney general was a guest of The Federalist Society and addressed students on property rights and other constitutional issues.
After his lecture, McDonnell was asked his opinion of whether guns are legal on campus, specifically as it relates to a recent incident at The University of Virginia's College at Wise. Earlier this month, student Steven Barber was expelled after campus police found three guns locked in the trunk of his car. Barber, who had a concealed-weapons permit, did not violate any state laws, but did break campus rules prohibiting guns.
Barber's vehicle was searched after college officials became concerned about a paper he wrote that referenced suicide and included a character who thought about killing a professor. A Scott County judge took away Barber's concealed-weapons permit, but he is appealing.
The attorney general said some aspects of Virginia's gun laws are not clear but his interpretation is that a college's board of visitors or governing body may determine its own policy regarding guns on campus.
A board of visitors has authority over those on campus, McDonnell said.
"That authority trumps the concealed-weapons law,"? he said.
During his address to ASL students, McDonnell said the U.S. Supreme Court will hear a gun-rights case today that could have major impact on the Second Amendment. Virginia has joined several other states in supporting the right to bear arms in the District of Columbia. The D.C. area prohibits handguns.
The attorney general said the case ? Heller v. District of Columbia ? is one of the most significant reviews of the Second Amendment in seven decades. The U.S. Court of Appeals for D.C. has ruled that the gun rule violates the constitutional right to bear arms.
McDonnell said the courts will examine whether the Second Amendment applies to a well-armed militia or individual rights to bear arms.
"That's the heart of the argument,"? he said.
After his lecture, McDonnell spoke about his support for Dominion Virginia Power's proposed $1.8 billion coal-fired power plant in Wise County. "We need to have additional generating capacity in Virginia,"? he said. "I certainly don't want to see us have brownouts like in California."?
Dominion has a plan to generate needed electricity while boosting the region's economy by burning Virginia coal and creating new jobs, he said.
McDonnell said the state Air Quality Control Board still has issues to iron out with regard to the proposed plant. Opponents say the pollution the plant would produce by burning coal and waste coal would be a health hazard, especially since the region already has a coal-fired plant a few miles away in Russell County.
The SCC and the Department of Environmental Quality must approve permits before Dominion can build the plant. The public-comment period is over for both and company officials say they hope to have the permits in place so construction can begin in April.

[CoeburnCane]

I agree 100% w/him on the power plant, diagree 200% with his interpretation of the concealed-weapons law getting trumped by the college's board of visitors rules.

He's basically saying that any law that the CBOV doesn't like, they can make a "rule" against it on campus and enforce it otherwise. If they don't like the seatbelt law--they can pull people over w/seat belts on and write them tickets. It may be hyperbole on my part, but that's the logic they're following. It's a slippery slope.

[sup-rbeast]

Who cares what the VA ATTY General thinks...his opinion doesn't create laws and put them in force. Little children believe in Santa Claus, doesn't mean we all do.

[pvfan]

Sup-rbeast believes in carrying guns onto college campuses, doesn't mean we all do.

[sup-rbeast]

No..I believe in rights and equality. A rarity nowdays.

[steer]

I'm still with the college on this situation. Banning guns from being on campus, I'm good with, and him getting expelled. There has to be something more to the story. I've wrote plenty of creative writing assignments, etc, talking all about violence, death, etc, etc.... and I have been pulled aside and talked to by professors, and reassured them it was just a writing.
So, IMO, the guy has had to have done something, or wrote something, and this just flipped the professor off.

[sup-rbeast]

If there is more to the story, I might change my opinion of their decision to expel him. But, if there was more, it would be out. I just think the premise for the college's search and action is wrong.