Editor's note: This letter to the editor is from March 20, 2016

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Apparently, it's not enough that UND's administration is attacking the quality of education by cutting programs and experienced faculty and jacking class sizes. Now, we must also feel under physical attack as well.

I look up from my office computer to see two figures in camo with guns outside my window. My first thought is for my students' and my safety: I grab my phone, crawl under my desk and call 911. The dispatcher keeps me on the line until someone can see if ROTC is doing maneuvers.

I can barely talk-first, with fear, and then with rage when the dispatcher reports back that yes, in fact, I've probably just seen ROTC cadets, though they're going to send an officer to check because no one has cleared it with them. They thank me for reporting it.

A few minutes later, a university officer calls me back-not to reassure me, but to scold me for calling 911. He says ROTC has permission to do this exercise. When I tell him that this was news to 911 and that they encouraged me to call whenever I see a gun on campus, he seems surprised.

He also tells me that ROTC will be doing these exercises for the next couple weeks.

So I reply that I guess I'll be calling 911 for the next couple weeks-and I will. Every time.

It's not my job to decide whether people carrying guns at school are an actual threat. It's my job to teach and to get home to my family.

It's already highly inappropriate to conduct unnecessary military maneuvers in the middle of the quad. But with school shootings on the increase and tensions at UND running high, it's especially irresponsible.

We're already under financial and emotional attack. We don't need to feel under physical attack, too.

Heidi Czerwiec

Grand Forks

Czerwiec is an associate professor of English at UND.