Safety On Campus

Careers and Colleges, March, 2001 by Nancy Fitzgerald

Most schools are safe havens for learning. But dangers--crime, alcohol abuse, fire hazards-- do exist. Knowing the realities can help you protect yourself.

It was the tail end of finals week, and Erica Madden [*], a sophomore at Indiana University in Bloomington, had gone to bed early while her roommates celebrated the finish of another school year. When the parry was over at about 3 in the morning, the roommates left to drive their friends back home, leaving Madden in the apartment alone -- or so they thought.

As soon as they pulled off in their cars, it seems, a couple of uninvited guests sashayed in through the apartment's unlocked door and proceeded to help themselves to what they wanted. When Madden's roommates returned, their four stereo speakers were gone, and there was an empty space where their prized recliner used to be. "It was kind of creepy," Madden admits, "to think that they were in the apartment while I was sleeping. It definitely shook me up. In theory, it was our fault since we left the door open. But we left it open most of the time -- we never felt threatened."

Campus security directors around the country agree: She should have been more cautious. "Once students get that familiar feeling on campus, says Dolores Stafford, chief of police at George Washington University in Washington, DC, "they end up feeling like it's home in a different way than they should. They feel like it's their mom's house." And that kind of complacency can lead to unhappy experiences like Madden's.

Property crimes like burglary and theft, as a matter of fact, make up the biggest chunk of campus crimes, or some 82,000 reported incidents in 1998, according to an annual survey by The Chronicle of Higher Education, Although the number of property crimes actually has decreased, other crimes on campus are up. The Chronicle reports that in 1998 murder was up 11 percent from the year before, as were forcible sex offenses. Arson and hate crimes were also up by more than 15 percent, and arrests for liquor violations soared by 24 percent. The crime stats closely match those of society in general.

"Even in safe environments, bad things can happen," says Kelly Tanabe, president of SuperCollege.com, a college-planning site. "The great majority of your fellow students are fine, but the reality is you have to be aware of your surroundings and take a few precautions."

You should begin by knowing the safety records at your college choices. You probably won't find a crime report in a college viewbook, but thanks to a law passed by Congress in 1990, that information is now easy to get.

The law is known as the Clery Act, named for Jeanne Clery, a 19-year-old student at Lehigh University in Pennsylvania who was raped, beaten, and killed in her dorm room in 1986. It requires all colleges to post their crime statistics on the Department of Education Web site, and to distribute an annual crime report to all students by October 1 of each year.

"For every campus visitor, we traditionally provide a security brochure," says Mike Frantz, dean of admission at Wilkes University, in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. "It not only includes campus crime statistics but also our proactive steps toward creating a safe campus community. We do nor go out of our way to tell families that security is an issue they need to investigate, but when questioned we are very frank about safety issues."

Crime is just one of the threats on campuses today--students also have to cope with the dangers of alcohol, drugs, fire, and even gambling. But by being aware of the dangers and taking precautions, you can have a safe college experience.

A DANGEROUS ARE

Scott Krueger was really smart. He had the brains--and the drive--to make it into technology, the Massachusetts Institute of one of the nation's top schools, where he planned to major in computer science. But in spite of his brains, he died of alcohol poisoning just one week into his freshman year in 1997, after an "Animal Night" fraternity parry that featured chugging a bottle of spiced rum.

Scott's tragic death illustrates a critical lesson for every student heading off to college: The biggest danger you may face there will be alcohol. Nationwide, 44 percent of students have engaged in binge drinking, according to the Harvard School of Public Health. According to The Chronicle, arrests for alcohol violations increased 24.3 percent from 1997 to 1998; arrests for drug violations grew by 11 percent.

And security officials say that not only does heavy drinking put you at risk for alcohol poisoning, it also makes you more likely to commit--or become a victim of--other crimes, too. "Alcohol is behind 90 percent of campus crime," says Howard Clery, father of Jeanne and the treasurer for Security on Campus, a crime information network in King of Prussia, Pennsylvania. It's often the fuel that fires crimes such as theft, vandalism, and rape. Seventy-five percent of male students involved in date rape, and 55 percent of female students, had been drinking or using drugs.