Shooting at Texas college injures three
Three people were wounded in a shooting between two men on the North Harris campus of Lone Star College near Houston, Texas at around 12:30 p.m. yesterday, according to an article in Reuters.
Witnesses stated the shooting occurred after an argument broke out between the men near the college’s library and dining hall, Houston television station KTRK-TV reported.
Two individuals were in urgent care for gunshot wounds, Reuters reported, and a third victim was in critical condition.
The community college was evacuated after the shooting. Videos and pictures of the school showed students fleeing classrooms and buildings, Reuters reported.
Police detained one of the suspects yesterday afternoon. The other suspect fled the campus, a Lone Star College spokesman said.
The incident marks the nation’s fourth school shooting in the past two weeks and the third at an institution of higher education. The events have received widespread attention in the wake of December’s massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut, which has spurred national debate about gun control in recent weeks.
All-female college struggles to address gender reassignment case
Controversy is brewing this month at Salem College, an all-female college in Winston-Salem, N.C., where a transgender student is reportedly scheduled to undergo gender reassignment surgery in February, according to an article in the Winston-Salem Journal.
The article cites an email written by a Salem College graduate and appears online with an editor’s note stating that some Salem students dispute the accuracy of the email. The students declined to comment further in order to protect the identity of their peer, the note stated.
According to the article, the student is asking the liberal arts college to allow him to remain on campus. Currently, some male students take undergraduate courses at the school’s adult education center, but they do not live on campus. Salem does not have an official policy governing transgender students, though administrators are evaluating whether to create one, the article stated.
The email, sent to fellow alums Jan. 5, denounced Salem’s lack of transparency in the process and expressed worries that the school would be rendered coeducational if the student were allowed to stay on campus, the article stated. The chairman of the college’s trustees told the Journal that there are no plans to make Salem coed.
Some outside experts argued that the student should be able to stay on campus because a transitioning student’s gender identity is not the school’s concern, according to the Journal.
States look to create $10,000 bachelor’s degree
A California legislator proposed a new pilot program for the state’s public university system that would offer students a way to earn a bachelor’s degree for only $10,000, the Chronicle of Higher Education reported this month.
The proposal follows similar announcements recently made by elected officials in Florida and Texas.
The program would include students receiving college credit for Advanced Placement courses in high school and attending two years of community college. Students could apply up to 60 transfer credits to state universities under the proposed plan. Most of the reduced student costs would fall on educational institutions, but the proposed legislation would have the state subsidize high schools, community colleges and universities. The Chronicle reported that the odds of passage for the bill — which has only one sponsor — are unclear.
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