Editorial Board

Disclaimer: Opinions in this article are that of the contributors of the editorial board which is composed of three different students. When we write “I” or “me” this does not reflect all of our opinions, but rather just one of our opinions. These opinions and experiences do not represent the greater Collegian Staff, the La Salle Student Body, or La Salle University as an institution. This editorial was written as a means of sharing thoughts and personal experiences as a vehicle to start a conversation about public safety at La Salle. This article is not the only opinion about public safety and its contents are not exhaustive. An editorial is simply “a newspaper article written by or on behalf of an editor that gives an opinion on a topical issue” (via Oxford Languages). 

Anytime I tell someone I go to La Salle I usually get similar responses like “Ugh the neighborhood,” “Isn’t it scary there?” “Hope you don’t leave campus at night,” etc. Perhaps you’ve heard similar responses or said these things yourself. I have come up with a pretty routine answer like “I have never had any issues with crime in the area. It exists, but violence is usually over interpersonal issues or in a struggle for someone’s property.” That being said we have all gotten the Citizen app notifications about someone being armed within a mile radius or La Salle alert Texts about crime in the area. 

I have been fortunate enough not to experience any type of crime interactions while attending La Salle, but I know that is not everyone’s experience. I believe that La Salle has a duty to protect students from any harm (crime-related or not) while they are on campus or coming to and from campus, and students have a duty to take advantage of the public safety resources that are available to them. But, I do not think La Salle is responsible for crime at large that students may hear about or be bystanders to off-campus. 

For resident assistants (RAs) and community assistants (CAs), campus safety is of utmost importance. In order to even be an RA or CA at La Salle, one has to train for two weeks before residents move in and the school year begins. Within training, the RAs and CAs work with public safety in different workshops to learn how to maintain safety on campus and help students in emergencies.

That being said, as an RA myself, I do feel safe on campus. I have a good relationship with public safety, I am educated on all of the safety features we have on campus and I know how to respond to on campus emergencies. However, I feel a big problem with safety we have on campus is that students do not know what safety features the campus has to offer and what the proper steps to take in an on campus emergency are. I myself luckily do because of the training I have as an RA. However, if I was not an RA, I cannot say that I would have access to all of the safety knowledge that I am equipped with.

I know that La Salle has offered some public safety seminars at the beginning of the school year for freshmen, however, most freshmen I have spoken to from this year and last year were not aware of these trainings or did not feel they needed to go. I believe that if La Salle somehow made the information presented in these meetings more accessible for students, then it would be more influential.

For example, one important piece of information I learned during RA training is to call public safety during an on campus emergency before calling 911. This is because when you call 911, responders do not know their way around campus, what building names are and the locations of buildings. If students call public safety first, public safety will send their own officers to the scene, call 911 from their end and personally direct first responders to the scene, so that they can get to the location of the emergency as quickly as possible. Without learning this knowledge from RA training, I would not have known to do this.

Another piece of advice I would have for students living on campus who are looking for more safety resources is to call the RA on duty number while in residence halls. The RAs and CAs are on duty every weekday from 6 p.m. until 8 a.m., and every weekend there is an RA on duty 24/7. The specific RA duty number for each building is posted on flyers throughout all of the residence halls and can be called in case of any problems. All RAs and CAs are trained to respond quickly in cases of emergencies and know what resources to use and who to call in case of these emergencies.

Having lived in St. Miguel for two years, I would encounter La Salle security at least twice a day – once leaving in the morning, and once coming home at night. On weekends, I would invite friends to come over and hang out in my townhouse, which of course is normal for a college student. For guests outside of the community of La Salle University, it makes sense to register them for a guest pass, even though it was kind of a pain to go through all of their information days before they came. For La Salle students, however, having to jump through hoops to have access to the campus that you pay for is annoying. So of course, back when there was a turnstile in townies, it became less of a hassle to double swipe, pass IDs back or use your roommate’s ID – less of a hassle until you got caught. 

La Salle would then make you write a letter of apology, make a poster on why not to do what you are being punished for and other persecutions that may or may not fit the crime. But, of course, not everyone is punished the same way. Students who have been caught passing back an ID by security have received emails from the school telling them about having to do the whole nine yards as punishment. Which, fair, the students have broken the rules, and living in an urban environment, we should understand that the rules are in place to keep us safe. But what happened to the other friend of mine who also passed back an ID? And still got caught? Nothing. La Salle was too busy to stay on her about making the poster and writing the paper. This leads me to my biggest qualm about La Salle’s persecution of breaking the rules.

If everyone were to be punished equally, there would be no true issues with how the school handles their punishments. But when different people are treated in different ways, even if there is no true bias besides the time of your crime, that is when things begin to get messy. Another issue is when the people doing the punishment handle the seriousness of the jobs differently – once, I was coming home to the townhouses when the security guards (not students, but those hired by the school) were smoking in the security booth. My guest at the time went to slide her ID to them and when they opened the little door, smoke poured out. And yet we are the ones getting in trouble for ‘sneaking’ La Salle students with valid student IDs into our homes? 

My sophomore year there was a break-in inside of the La Salle Apartments and I know a handful of people whose cars have either been broken into or stolen on La Salle’s campus throughout my four years here. The Annual Security and Fire Safety Report describes “the University’s policies and programs designed to aid in keeping the community safe; to share information on crime and disciplinary referral statistics, emergency preparedness and planning; and fire safety, fire statistics, and other fire-related information in residence facilities.”

I do understand why there are certain rules put in place. Although they may be annoying to go through, they are put in place to protect us. We don’t go to a school in a college town, we go to school in an environment within a city, in a neighborhood that belongs to people beyond La Salle’s immediate community, so of course these rules make sense. But when students aren’t allowed in certain areas of their own campus or when different security guards and administrators handle punishment differently, it becomes hard to want to follow these rules.  

Crime in Philadelphia and society in general is an issue much larger than La Salle University. Factors like poverty, social environments, and family structure all influence crime. According to the United States Department of Justice, in “ 2008–12, persons living in poor households at or below the Federal Poverty Level (FPL) (39.8 per 1,000) had more than double the rate of violent victimization as persons in high-income households.” Another study shows an explanation for the inequality-crime association as being “compositional: individuals offend when their own absolute level of resources is desperately low, and the effect of increasing inequality is to make such desperation more prevalent.” These factors behind crime seem to me to be things La Salle University is in general not responsible for.

The zip code that hosts La Salle University encompasses Logan, Ogontz and Fern Rock. People with real lives live around La Salle – not just your favorite frat boys and women’s sports team. The median income of Logan, Ogontz, and Fern Rock is just about $34,651 according to income by zip code. For some perspective, La Salle’s tuition is $34,270. 

If poverty is truly an indicator of why crime happens, perhaps La Salle University ought to look beyond busting students for underage drinking, parking tickets and public safety officers scrolling on their phones and look to the causes behind crime and public safety around our campus to make a true effort in ensuring public safety. 

In addition, in my own personal experience, I think that among the student body, there is a mocking or disrespectful attitude toward public safety issues in the area. I think that students almost think it is funny to get Citizen notifications about someone being armed with an object like a chair, and I am sure I once joined in with this banter. But, one day we as students will move away from 20th and Olney, but crime and violence will still exist near La Salle and in the larger Philadelphia area. This issue is deeper than La Salle public safety and student jokes about going to school in *insert derogatory names for the area*. Crime is a societal issue that is beyond La Salle, Logan, Ogontz, Fern Rock and Philadelphia. 

For some, living in Philadelphia or any urban environment can be scary from time to time because of the nature of crime in a city. I can confidently say that while on campus I do feel safe. I give much of that credit to my RA training for providing me with precautionary and emergency resources that make me feel safe. So, I think the most beneficial thing we can do as a school to make sure our students are safe on and off campus is to educate everyone on campus safety knowledge.