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EDITORIAL: The case for a tobacco-free campus 

Gone, thankfully, are the days when a popular, exquisitely cool University of Oregon professor was known for chain-smoking Gauloises throughout his lectures on Jean-Paul Sartre.

Sartre, the professor was fond of pointing out, smoked the French-made Gauloises, too.

Years later, of course, Sartre died of a lung tumor, people got smarter about the hazards of tobacco and professors and students are mercifully prohibited from lighting up in classrooms at most U.S. colleges. The smokers have been moved outdoors.

At Portland Community College, Student Body President Victoria Galanopoulos wants to change that. She and a PCC task force, backed by the American Lung Association of Oregon, want to snuff smoking anywhere on the college's campuses, including the outdoor entryways where smokers now gather.

PCC administrators should support steps that begin moving the college toward that worthy goal.

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