Thursday, March 20, 2014

Feel safe on campus?, by Stella Nathan


The University of Wisconsin-Lacrosse doesn’t have security guards around the school grounds or in classroom buildings. Last year on campus a student walked into one of the classrooms with an empty rifle slung over his back. The teacher did not even notice the student. The situation was taken care of and luckily no one was injured.

There have been at least 44 school shootings since the Newtown school shooting on December 14, 2012. 36 percent of the 44 shootings took place on college campuses and universities. 

K-12 schools have safety perceptions put in place to try and protect the students. The school doors are supposed to be locked at all times. In many cases, visitors must ring a bell to be buzzed in to enter, and they have to show some form of photo ID, and sign in. Sometimes visitors have to wait at the door and may not even go back to the classrooms.

These safety measures are put in place for k-12, but colleges and universities work a lot different. At UWL the side doors to the dorms are locked and one can only gain access with the correct student ID. But the front doors of the dorm halls are unlocked until 10 at night. Anyone can walk in. The school also does not have security guards standing at the major entrances checking IDs.

The classroom buildings are open to the public. They are not locked. Very few teachers keep their actual classroom doors locked as well.  The teachers most likely do not have the keys because the classroom buildings are used by many different teachers and staff. If a threat were to enter the school, there wouldn’t be very many forces to stop it. Campus police are one call away, but there isn’t any presence of security.


People could argue that UWL is a very safe school and that not a lot of crime happens here; But it only takes one person who decides that they want to shoot up a school.