Last year, the police were called to Cabrini’s campus a total of 18 times. Since the beginning of school in late August, the police have been called 24 times, 15 times in September alone. The question running through many minds is “What is happening to our campus?’
Cabrini once held the reputation of a small, safe school in the beautiful woods of well-to-do Radnor, Pa. Students were not afraid to walk across campus alone or go down the hall and leave their door open. Now, it is a totally different story.
In just two weeks, a handful of serious incidents have occurred that have jeopardized the safety of the campus. Students were bloodied in fights. A student was sexually assaulted. A former student was entering rooms in the Cabrini Apartment Complex taking money. The Haunted Trail was cancelled due to irresponsible drunks. Police dogs were on campus looking for a gun supposedly pulled in a drunken altercation. These were just the events reported.
These incidents are especially unfortunate because Cabrini students are not the sole individuals involved. A majority of these incidents concerned students that were not from Cabrini. The houses have no policing of who enters and exits, so the residents can have any guest they want over. In turn, no one is controlling these guests and the result is the unsafe incidents that have been occurring on campus.
One good thing may come out of these incidents-the students are stirred up now and we are mad. Our campus has gone from secure to hazardous and the students are fed up. The members of the Campus Activities and Programming Board took the first step and cancelled the Haunted Trail because their safety and the safety of the attendants was jeopardized. Now, the Student Government Association is stepping in.
SGA has brought up the idea of putting guarded gates around the three entrances of the college. Public Safety officers would sit at the gates and every single visitor would have to sign in and out. Public Safety would know who was entering the campus at all times, not just during visitation hours. They would have on record everyone who is on campus. This way, when a problem occurs and non-Cabrini students are involved, there would be a sure way to find out who has the guests over and who the guests are.
What is it going to take for students to feel safe on our campus? The incidents that have been happening should open up the eyes of the administration. Our campus is no longer the small Cabrini they are used to-we have grown and more measures for our safety need to be implemented. They should no longer have the wool pulled over their eyes-something needs to be done.
Posted to the web by Ryan Norris
