No knives in the dorms...

L

Lurp

Joined
Jul 15, 2005
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493
I will be starting my first year of college this year at the University of Texas and have been entrigued by knives since i was atleast 12. You can ask anyone i know and they will tell you that i have atleast 2 knives on me at all times. They have been such a great tool to have an carry and have come in handy more times than i can even begin to remember. The problem is that today i called up the housing office to ask if it was ok to bring a pocket knife to the dorms when i was given the response of "Oh no! Of course not.". This immediatley made me think what went wrong where common pocket knives are not accepted among people that kill 50,000 people a year in cars and allow students to bring cars on campus and dont think of their car as a weapon but yet think of a 3 inch peice of sharpened steel as a bigger threat. I am just wondering what life is going to be like without an EDC pocket knife...I think outside of school i have never been caught without a knife for the past 6 years. This will be an interesting change that i will have to adapt to...
 
You don't have to adapt to anything...carry your knife, but be discrete. I carried a knife (sometimes 2) to every college class I ever attended and never heard anything about it. All universities have a no knife policy, but I would just ignore that. I see leaving the house without a knife as dangerous and irresponsible. I wouldn't leave my knife at home simply because the university is ignorant. If something comes up that you really need a knife, you're going to be kicking yourself. Staying alive is more important than attending a university.

Unless you go around waving your knife around and acting crazy, you shouldn't have any problems.
 
Thats what i was thinking, but if i ever do get caught i supposedly get kicked out of the dorms and no refund on my payment. That means no place to live and thousands lost. But maybe i will just carry something such as a buck 110 or a SAK as to not look as threatening as whipping out my 4 inch "tactical" tanto by flicking my wrist that will drive all the sheeple to write to Sarah Brady and Dianne Feinstein about banning knives after the traitors attempt to betray our American freedom to bear arms...
 
Yeah, sometimes its better just not to ask those kind of questions. Use common sense and don't be showy about what you are carrying and you should be fine. If your really concerned about getting busted on the issue just carry a traditional slipjoint pocket knife, i'm sure the asshat crowd would view that as less threatening. Its a shame that people has to be "educated" in places like this huh? I'm dating a girl that can't fathom why I think all of her college friends and proffessors are a bunch of liberal pinkos....this is why! :rolleyes:
 
Check the state laws and the school code and make sure that the person you talked to actually knows what the rules are, and isn't just talking out of his/her ass giving you a kneejerk response. I can guarantee you that the vast majority of people, even those who you might expect to know (officials, cops, etc) don't really know about these things. 99% of the people on the street here would say that switchblades are illegal here, but they aren't. "Oh no! Of course not" sounds quite a bit like a kneejerk assumption to me.

It might in fact be the truth, but don't just take some person's word for it.
 
a SAK is definately the safest bet (other than carrying no knife at all, I carried my caly Jr. in res and no one seemed to mind although I dont think my res had a no knife policy).
 
I agree- go with the SAK. No college experience is complete without a corkscrew. :D
 
These days most colleges post official policies on their websites. See if you can find the official dorm policies. Likewise they usually send you a packet of documents when you sign up for the dorm, read them. Regardless of whether you bring a knife you should bring a few tools. You should have some pliers, some needle nose pliers, a couple types of screwdrivers, and maybe a hammer. As an alternative a good multitool is a bare minimum.

I would bring a SAK and a multitool as the most defensible knives. I would not consider a Buck 110 as something sheeple friendly. What I would consider borderline sheeple friendly is a SAK with a 3.25-inch locking blade like the Victorinox Adventurer model:
http://www.campmor.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay?productId=13551&memberId=12500226
 
Hmmm....I kept a couple of rifles in my dorm room, but that was more than a couple of years ago. I carried a pocket knife everywhere I went (I did this in high school as well).

I'll second (or third) the SAK suggestion. Even if the no knife policy turns out to be true, few people bat an eye when you use an SAK in public. Be discreet, don't show off, and you'll be fine.
 
I carried a SAK on my keychain for 4 years in undergrad and I had some knife or other in my pocket with a visible pocket clip for 3 years in my doctoral program. Never had a single problem with either of them.
No college experience is complete without a corkscrew.
Click to expand...
I think the bottle opener is probably more suited for college life! :D
 
Read the Universities policies and state law. By state law, fixed blades over 2.5" are banned on campus, but folders are okay at any length. In the University catalog, it says there is a 5" blade length maximum for pocketknives. Plenty generous if you ask me!
 
I'm sure glad I'm not your age. When I was in college I not only carried a 110 on my belt openly, I had a shotgun and a pistol in my room. No problems at all. Hard to believe how much liberty people have surrendered in the last 30 years.
I guess I would not be able to comply with that policy and I wouldn't maka big deal out of it - unless someone else did. Then my lawyer would earn what I pay him.
Bob
 
I had a son and a daughter go through UT with some time spent in dorms. Both kept and carried knives. I'm not telling you what to do, clearly there could be a downside, but as long as you are smart and don't piss off your suite-mates you will probably be fine.

Jack
 
First get the rules in writing, not somebody's personal opinion over the phone.

If knives are allowed then keep a copy of the rules handy since there will be some authority that has a grudge against knives and will attempt to push you around with their interpretation of what they think the rules are (or should be).

If knives are not allowed don't carry them under any circumstance. You are spending substantial resources (both your time and the money) to go to college and it is not worth getting booted out of school for some dumb rule. Just remember this so that sometime in the future you might be able to change some of the goofy rules that are out there in society.

If you have a car and knives are not allowed in the dorms then you might want to keep them locked in the glove compartment.

I wonder how many students have kitchen/paring knives in their dorms to cutup snacks like carrots, apples, etc. I know that 80% of the girls in my daughter's dorm do.

When I went to school we didn't need a corkscrew because we didn't buy (couldn't afford) the fancy stuff. A church-key, now that was always a handy tool to have around!

Welcome to the world of governmental regulations! It's gets much worse, IMHO. Rules are not a substitute for common sense and moral values not matter how many you pass! My $.02.
 
I'm a junior undergrad. College policy states 'no knives or blades of any description'. I've carried spyderco folders every day I've been here, often clipped openly. There is a difference between what is against the rules and what is enforced. It shouldn't be like that, but I'm certaintly willing to take advantage of the discrepency when it's a tyrannical policy. They sell exacto knives in the campus bookstore. Hmm. And I use my knives almost every day in one way or another in the physics lab.

I do not live on campus, because I refuse to live under those conditions, I am an adult person, I have a lifestyle that doesn't permit it, bigscreen tvs, aquariums, furniture. Pointless to rent a storage facility for my stuff so I can live in a dorm. Plus I can't imagine not having my workbench or being able to tinker with my paintball gear. And I have my own bathroom.


I stand to lose a $50,000 scholarship, without which I could not afford to go to college. But I would rather lose my education than be defensless as I was beaten to death with a bike lock, as happened unprovoked recently to a college student in Illinois.

I'm also going to add that you have no business carrying weapons of any kind while drinking or partying. I like my knives, so for me, this means I don't drink in public. Freedom comes with responsibility.
 
I carried a Spyderco Endura or Vic Soldier back in the day (everyday) when I was in school. This was in Fairfax VA, so if your discrete I don't think anyone would care in Texas.

If your going to take a bigger fixed blade just spend $24 on a lock box at Walmart.

I would also recommend buying a leatherman Charge, Wave, or Surge. People seem a lot less alarmed by multi tools.
 
Well, you could always head a few miles over and go to A&M. ;) I carried a knife every day that I was there. Of course, I was also in the Corps of Cadets and we occassionally would "attack" the quadrangle with M16s (blanks of course) and artillery simulators as a recruiting tool. In short, pocket knives were not something worried about there. :D
 
When I went to college, just recently- I carried my buck 110 and used it to sharpen my pencils when necessary. I never had a negative comment. If I had been stabbing the table with it or waving it around, it might have been different. Just use common sense- You shouldnt have a problem. Truthfully, I wouldnt want to go to a school that had such restrictive and ass-backwards policies- Its bad enough that they have banned all pocket knives in regular school as well- I never was without a SAK or my Buck 110, starting in about 7th grade on up. The fact that they keep trying to ban simple tools turns my stomache.
 
i always had a knife at school, and i still do carry to school. No knives? are you not allowed to have a steak knife? I bet it also says no foreman grills...but you'll bring one anyways. I bet it says a lot of things. If you get caught once, and they do care, they most likely will have one talk with you about it. big deal.
 
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