2008 Woodie Awards
Analysis shows slow release of crime alerts
David Minsky
Issue date: 4/18/07 Section: News
The decision-making of university officials at Virginia Tech on Monday is raising new questions about how quickly university students and staff should be notified about threats to the community.
At this university, police use a similar notification system as at Virginia Tech: Crime alert e-mails. But an analysis of this university's e-mail crime alert practices over the past two years shows that although the campus community is regularly notified of crimes viewed as threats, the e-mails are sometimes sent out many hours after the crime, and on average they take nearly two days to reach students.
Concern about notification systems like crime alert e-mails is mounting across the country as students and parents at Virginia Tech have stepped up complaints that officials were slow in alerting the campus to the threat posed by an early morning fatal shooting in a predominantly freshmandorm. Security experts have told experts a quicker response could have saved lives.
Although this university has never recorded a murder on the campus, the analysis of 39 crime alert e-mails involving violent crimes and sex offenses over the past two years shows a pattern that suggests a sluggish approach to notification. Even notice of the most recent gun violence on this campus - a 2005 shooting near Susquehanna Hall that hospitalized a student - took more than 12 hours to reach student inboxes.
Crime alert e-mails for all other violent crimes and sex offenses took, on average, just over 40 hours to reach the campus community. As much as possible, the time periods analyzed were based on when crimes were reported to police - not when the crime occurred - and based on the crime alert e-mail time stamps of two separate university students.
Vice President for Student Affairs Linda Clement called the sluggish reporting concerning.
"Two days is a long time," Clement said. "I hope we could improve that statistic."
School security experts have told reporters the Virginia Tech massacre will likely prompt universities nationwide to reevaluate notification systems, and they said faster responses harnessing technology like text messaging could aid in security reviews. John Morgan, a former police chief and law enforcement project specialist at the School Violence Resource Center, called the 12-hour gap in reporting the shooting in 2005 particularly disquieting.
At this university, police use a similar notification system as at Virginia Tech: Crime alert e-mails. But an analysis of this university's e-mail crime alert practices over the past two years shows that although the campus community is regularly notified of crimes viewed as threats, the e-mails are sometimes sent out many hours after the crime, and on average they take nearly two days to reach students.
Concern about notification systems like crime alert e-mails is mounting across the country as students and parents at Virginia Tech have stepped up complaints that officials were slow in alerting the campus to the threat posed by an early morning fatal shooting in a predominantly freshmandorm. Security experts have told experts a quicker response could have saved lives.
Although this university has never recorded a murder on the campus, the analysis of 39 crime alert e-mails involving violent crimes and sex offenses over the past two years shows a pattern that suggests a sluggish approach to notification. Even notice of the most recent gun violence on this campus - a 2005 shooting near Susquehanna Hall that hospitalized a student - took more than 12 hours to reach student inboxes.
Crime alert e-mails for all other violent crimes and sex offenses took, on average, just over 40 hours to reach the campus community. As much as possible, the time periods analyzed were based on when crimes were reported to police - not when the crime occurred - and based on the crime alert e-mail time stamps of two separate university students.
Vice President for Student Affairs Linda Clement called the sluggish reporting concerning.
"Two days is a long time," Clement said. "I hope we could improve that statistic."
School security experts have told reporters the Virginia Tech massacre will likely prompt universities nationwide to reevaluate notification systems, and they said faster responses harnessing technology like text messaging could aid in security reviews. John Morgan, a former police chief and law enforcement project specialist at the School Violence Resource Center, called the 12-hour gap in reporting the shooting in 2005 particularly disquieting.
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