Last school year, there were 1,615 total campus crimes, with a wide range in severity. Campus crimes through February for this school year have totaled 797 so far. Some have been robbed, some have been injured, and some are scared – but there has been no loss of life.

The University bans guns on campus as a result of a Board of Regents ruling in 2003 in response to the conceal and carry law. In the aftermath of the Virginia Tech shooting last year though, where 32 students and faculty members were killed, Rep. Tony Cornish, R-Good Thunder, has proposed to remove Minnesota universities’ authority to ban guns. The bill would allow students 21 and older with gun permits to bring weapons on campus, excluding University of Minnesota campuses – because of autonomy from state statutes under the Minnesota Constitution, University of Minnesota campuses would not be affected by the legislation.

Cornish and gun advocates maintain that armed and trained students could prevent or minimize campus violence – some have even suggested the Virginia Tech incident could have been avoided if students had weapons.

But what is just as likely as that supposition, is that one of those armed students could have accidentally shot a student in the weeks leading up to the school shooting, or a student could have used a gun to resolve an altercation that escalated too quickly for that person to use better judgment. Also, considering the high rates of depression and alcohol and drug abuse in college, armed students would be prone to bad decisions.

What would have better prevented the school shooting in Virginia is if the shooter had been prevented to purchase weapons because of his mental instability.

Guns enable the opportunity for violence. To encourage students to carry loaded weapons could only increase violence on campus. Instead of a student being robbed at gunpoint, an armed student could pull his or her gun and the potential for at least one person to be mortally injured would undoubtedly increase.