Campus Crime

Despite the fact that deviance in all its forms has existed on college and university campuses since their inception, criminological interest in colleges and universities in this country as contexts for crime and victimization did not begin in earnest until the 1990s and passage of the federal Student Right-to-Know and Campus Security Act of 1990 (see the separate Oxford Bibliographies in Criminology articles “Contextual Analysis of Crime” and “School Crime and Violence”). Now known as the Clery Act, the legislation requires that all postsecondary institutions participating in federal financial aid programs publicly report their crime statistics and security policies each year. Taking cues from scholarship on how the characteristics and dynamics of workplaces, neighborhoods, and schools relate to patterns of crime and victimization occurring in them, scholarship on campus crime has sought since the 1990s to identify and understand, theoretically and empirically, how variability in the dimensions of the campus—physical size and features as well as location, size, and diversity of the student body—are related to patterns of crime and victimization occurring on them. This article discusses campus crime by examining several topics, including early, groundbreaking work as well as more recent scholarship associated with them. The article begins with studies providing General Overviews of the social, legal, and administrative contexts of campus crime. The article then examines Theoretical Perspectives on Campus Crime that have been used to explain patterns and trends in campus crime. The third section examines commonly used Data Sources on campus crime, followed by a discussion of Campus Crime Incidents and Types. The fifth section discusses Fear and Perceived Risk of Victimization on Campus. The sixth section of the article describes Campus Policing and Security. The concluding section, Responding to and Preventing Campus Crime, examines efforts at preventing campus crime and responses to it by colleges and universities in the United States.

Performing Heteronormativity: The Discourse of the College Hook up Culture and Sexuality

This paper focuses on the college hook up culture and slut discourse. I analyze the documentary feature ‘‘Spitting Game: The College Hook Up Culture’’ that present a provocative sense of the hook up culture. Drawing from the narratives of students presented in the documentary, I argue that the college hook up culture is bounded with heteronormativity, where participants of the culture are performing gender positions available to them. I claim that the culture privileges masculinity and necessitates heteronormal performances in order for students to participate. Often ignored by the discourse of campus crime, I argue that women are true victims and they take up sexual performances only with great diffıculty as articulated with slut discourse.

Criminal Records and College Admissions: A Modified Experimental Audit

This article considers the effect of criminal records on college admissions. Most colleges require criminal history information on their applications, suggesting that an applicant’s criminal history could be a significant impediment to accessing the benefits of higher education. We conducted a modified experimental audit to learn whether criminal records affect admissions decisions. Matched same-race pairs of tester applications were sent to a national sample of non-elite four-year colleges, with both testers applying as either Black or White. Within each pair, one application signaled a prior low-level felony conviction when required by the application. Consistent with research on employment, the rejection rate for applicants with felonies was 2½ times the rate of our control testers. But unlike the large racial differences observed in employment, we find smaller racial differences in admissions decisions. Nevertheless, Black applicants with criminal records who disclosed their records were particularly penalized at colleges with high campus crime rates. We address implications for reentry, racial progress, and the college “Ban the Box” movement. We suggest colleges consider narrowing the scope of such inquiries or removing the question altogether – particularly when it conflicts with the goals of these institutions, including reducing the underrepresentation of students of color.

Contextualizing the 1990 campus security act and campus sexual assault in intersectional and historical terms

Purpose Residential college campuses remain dangerous – especially for women students who face a persistent threat of sexual violence, despite passage of the 1990 Campus Security Act and its multiple amendments. Campuses have developed new programming, yet recent research confirms one in five women will experience some form of sexual assault before graduating. Research on campus crime legislation does not describe in detail the context in which it developed. The purpose of this paper is to draw attention to the effects of early rhetorical frames on the ineffective policy. Design/methodology/approach The authors discuss the rhetorical construction of “campus crime,” and related “criminals” and “victims,” through content analysis and a close interpretive reading of related newspaper articles. Findings The 1986 violent rape and murder of Jeanne Clery at Lehigh University in Pennsylvania became iconic in media descriptions of campus crime. Media drew attention to the racial and classed dimensions of the attack on Clery, but elided the misogyny central to all sexual assaults. This reinforced a stereotype that “insiders” on campuses, primarily white and middle class, were most vulnerable to “outsider” attacks by persons of color. Colleges and universities adopted rhetoric of “endangerment” and “unreason” and focused on what potential victims could do to protect themselves, ignoring the role of students in perpetrating crime. Research limitations/implications This analysis does not link rhetoric in newspapers to legislative discussion. Further analysis is necessary to confirm the impact of particular claims and to understand why some claims may have superseded others. Originality/value This analysis focuses critical attention on how campus crime policy is shaped by cultural frames.