Safety on campus: Most schools are safe havens for learning. But dangers—crime, alcohol abuse, hazards—do exist. Knowing the realities can help you protect yourself

Careers and Colleges, March, 2002 by Nancy Fitzgerald

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 party 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, 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, director 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 34,268 reported incidents in 2000, according to an annual survey by The Chronicle of Higher Education. That's an increase of 2 percent from 1999, and across the board most types of campus crimes have inched up. The Chronicle reports that in 2000 murder was up 45 percent from the year before (from 11 to 16 incidents), as were hate crimes (up 38 percent) and arson (up 8.5 percent).

"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 Clety, who, in 1986 as a 19-year-old student at Lehigh University in Pennsylvania, was raped, beaten, and killed in her dorm room. It requires all colleges to post their crime statistics on the Department of Education Web site (www.ed.gov), 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 enrollment services 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.

Scott Krueger was really smart. He had the brains--and the drive--to make it into the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, one of the nations 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 party that featured chugging a bottle of spiced rum.

Krueger'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 4.2 percent from 1999 to 2000; arrests for drug violations grew by 10.2 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, according to the Journal of Counseling Psychology.

"Without a doubt, drinking makes you more vulnerable to crimes," explains Akin Hackett, a senior at the University of Georgia in Athens, and student director of Safe Campuses Now, a student activist organization. "Since you're unable to focus on your surroundings you can be easily attacked."