Deborah Ballard-Reisch, a communications professor at Wichita State University, has decided to resign due to a law allowing concealed weapons on campus.
Ballard-Reisch, a tenured professor in Wichita State’s Elliott School of Communication, submitted her resigination letter to WSU President John Bardo this week, detailing her plans to retire on July 1, the day the law is set to go into effect.
Under current Kansas law, public colleges in will have to open their campuses to concealed firearms starting this summer on July 1. Ballard-Reisch says the law is “in opposition to the values of higher education.”
via Sacramento Bee:
Kansas passed a law in 2013 that enabled people to bring guns into public buildings. Public universities and community colleges were given a four-year extension to comply.
Two years ago, Kansas removed the requirement that anyone who carries a concealed handgun obtain a permit, acquired by paying a licensing fee and completing an eight-hour training course.
She says she chose to retire and to make her resignation letter public to send a message to state lawmakers and others who support the campus-carry measure.
Ballard-Reisch, 59, worked at Wichita State for a decade, teaching classes in crisis communication, research methods and health communication as the Kansas Health Foundation Distinguished Chair in Strategic Communication.
At the time of this writing, ten states in the union have decided to allow concealed weapons on public college campuses: Arkansas, Colorado, Georgia, Idaho, Kansas, Mississippi, Oregon, Texas, Utah and Wisconsin.
