Campus Safety

Community college campuses should be a safe place, and these policies, controversial or not, aim to achieve that goal. Schools have banned sex offenders from campus, allowed security to carry guns and installed surveillance cameras in an effort to keep students safe. Here we’ll cover the latest crime and safety policies in place on campuses across the country.

View the most popular articles in Campus Safety:

Firearms Banned at Some Community Colleges this Fall

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Firearms Banned at Some Community Colleges this Fall
In an effort to increase safety, some community colleges will be banning firearms completely on campus. We look at some of the areas that will be taking this approach this school year.

In light of increasing concerns over campus safety, some community colleges are banning firearms this fall. The move has renewed debate over whether guns should be allowed on campus, whether carried by students, faculty, or both. While there are arguments to be made in favor of either position, the trend for this year appears to be focused on keeping guns off campus in hopes of keeping students just a little safer during the school year.

California Community Colleges Say No to Guns

The Los Angeles Times reports that all nine campuses in the Los Angeles Community College District in California will become gun-free zones when students head back to class this fall. The Board of Trustees for the schools recently voted unanimously to ban firearms in nearly all circumstances for this school year.

“It is our responsibility to provide a safe environment for our students, allowing them to feel secure and able to totally focus on their academic goals,” Scott Svonkin, vice president of the board, told the L.A. Times. “They must never be fearful about setting foot on one of our campuses,” Svonkin added.

Previous Shootings Spur Decision

The reasoning behind the ban was a string of violent school shootings, with the most recent occurring at Santa Monica College in June, 2013. During that incident, another Los Angeles Times article reported that five victims died, along with the shooter. The 10-minute rampage began when the shooter killed his father and

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Are Guns Coming to Community College Campuses?

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Are Guns Coming to Community College Campuses?
In light of a string of school shootings in recent months, a number of community colleges are considering arming security officers on campus. What do students and faculty think of the idea?

Recent tragedies at schools nationwide have caused many community colleges to take a serious look at their security policies. At the forefront is whether guards and officers on community college campuses should be allowed to carry firearms. While some college administrators make good arguments for the allowance of weapons, others have equally compelling arguments against the practice. These community colleges offer a small sample of the schools that are grappling with the issue of guns on their campuses.

Holyoke Community College Heeding Massachusetts Report

Holyoke Community College in Massachusetts is looking in-depth at the possibility of arming campus guards after a report on campus violence prevention was released for Massachusetts schools. The Massachusetts Department of Higher Education report recommends that “sworn campus police officers should be armed and trained in the use of personal or specialized firearms.” The report was compiled in the aftermath of the Virginia Tech mass shooting in 2007 and another incident at Northern Illinois University in 2008.

According to mLive, the Holyoke Community College Campus Safety Committee is now considering arming the school’s nine full-time police officers. All employees, including Massachusetts Criminal Justice Training Academy graduates or the Massachusetts State Police Training Academy, are not allowed to carry guns on campus. However, after a lockdown situation on the college campus in February, the question of armed guards to handle active shooter situations was once again raised.

The Holyoke Community College Campus Safety Committee was formed by the chairwoman of

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Is Your Community College Safe? New Rankings Released

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Is Your Community College Safe? New Rankings Released
We’ll look at new rankings from StateUniversity.com that shows which colleges are considered the safest in the country. The good news is many community colleges made the list!

Students may select the location for their post-secondary education from a variety of factors, including tuition costs, degree programs available and quality of education received. This is true for prospective community college students, as well as those looking at a possible four-year degree. One factor that may not be at the top of a searching student’s list is campus safety. However, staying safe while you are pursuing your degree is an important characteristic that contributes to the overall college experience. Fortunately, StateUniversity.com has you covered, with annual rankings that let prospective students know which college campuses are considered the safest in the country.

Choosing the Safest School

When StateUniversity.com begins its annual process of ranking U.S. colleges for safety, the first step is to take data directly from the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Since private colleges do not have to report their crime figures to the FBI, some of these schools may not appear on the list. However, all schools that participate in federal student aid programs are required to report crime numbers every year, keeping most of the schools around the country under consideration for the rankings. For the 2011 rankings, about 450 of the largest schools in the United States were evaluated.

This video highlights the breadth and scope of college and university law enforcement volunteer efforts.

Crime reports for 2015 were considered when compiling the most recent

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Renewed Push for Guns on Campus by Arizona Lawmakers

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Renewed Push for Guns on Campus by Arizona Lawmakers
Although Governor Jan Brewer vetoed the bill last year, Arizona lawmakers plan to introduce a new bill allowing guns on college campuses in 2012

Arizona lawmakers are continuing their fight to allow students and faculty to carry guns on college campuses across the state. One state legislator has plans to introduce a new gun law in the opening session on January 9, ensuring the bill would not get lost in the rest of the business of the state as the year progresses. Despite the veto of a similar bill by Governor Jan Brewer last year, those in support of allowing guns on campuses feel confident that this year’s bill will get the governor’s blessings.

Why Guns on Campus?

The issue of allowing guns on university and community college campuses has been a hot-button topic since the shooting at Virginia Tech University in 2007 left 33 dead, including students, faculty members, and the shooter. According to AZ Central, Arizona lawmakers began introducing gun bills that following year, stating trained gun owners would provide another layer of protection for colleges throughout the state. The recent Arizona shootings in 2011 by former Pima Community College student Jared Loughner, who wounded and killed dozens of people at a shopping mall, including US Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, have further fueled the fire of these gun movements.

Currently, Arizona law allows individual schools to make the decision of whether to allow guns on their campuses, although none of the colleges in the state allow weapons on campus at this time.

“A gun-free zone really becomes self-defense-free zones,” Arizona State Senator Ron Gould told My

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Lessons Community Colleges Can Learn from the Arizona Shooting Tragedy

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Lessons Community Colleges Can Learn from the Arizona Shooting Tragedy
The Arizona shooter was a community college student who had shown clear signs of trouble while on campus. What can community colleges learn from the tragedy in moving forward?

Ever since tragedy hit Virginia Tech in 2007, college campuses have been examining ways to make their schools safer for students and faculty. The more recent shootings in Arizona have further illustrated the need for intervention with disturbed students who could pose a potential danger to themselves or others. However, identifying the problem and finding a reasonable solution are two very different things. We will take a look at how some colleges are learning lessons from the Arizona tragedy and using what they learned to enhance safety on their campuses.

About Jared Loughner

Jared Loughner was a student at Pima Community College in Tucson. The college became concerned about some of Loughner's erratic behavior and eventually suspended him from the school. A few months after Loughner's suspension, he opened fire on a shopping mall in Arizona, wounding 13 and killing six people, including U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords.

According to a report at Google News, officials at Pima Community College released 51 pages of police documents on Loughner, depicting him as "creepy," "very hostile," and "having difficulty understanding what he did wrong in the classroom."

When Loughner released a YouTube video that called the college a "scam" and associated it with genocide, school officials told Loughner and his parents that he was no longer able to return to his classes. He would also need to obtain a report from a psychiatrist attesting to his mental health before coming back to the school campus again.

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