There are a lot of things everyone ought to be old enough to know by the time they enter college. There are at least two that some NIU students haven’t mastered: You don’t steal stop signs, and you don’t set your pets free when you get tired of them.

Most people have experienced the adrenalin rush that results when another driver runs a stop sign and nearly causes an accident. It’s nice to be able to place the blame on the idiot driver for failing to obey the law.

In DeKalb, the blame could quite possibly lie with a student who stole the stop sign that the “idiot driver” was expected to see, but obviously could not.

Criminal aspects aside, the fact is, there’s a major difference between stealing a street sign—because it contains one’s name or just sounds catchy—and stealing a stop sign. Without the street sign, drivers might not know where they are. But without the stop sign, drivers are without a traffic signal—and just might die.

Students who are tempted to take that bright red “wall decoration” should give themselves a thorough thrashing. Causing someone’s injury or death is a hard way to learn what one should know through common sense.

Common sense should also prevail when students make decisions to acquire pets. A dog or cat is not the living equivalent of a Brillo pad—to be kept as long as useful and then thrown away.

Before students decide to get a pet, there are two major issues they should address. The first is whether they can afford to take care of the pet to begin with. The second is what they’ll do with the animal if they find they can’t afford it or can’t keep it for some other reason.

The answer to the second question should never be to let the animal run free to fend for itself on the streets. If students can’t commit to taking proper care of animals and find appropriate homes for them when they graduate, then they do not need a pet. And the pet does not need a student.