We tend to think of college campuses as the idyllic place to send our kids for their first taste of the real world, but a new analysis shows crime on college campuses has rebounded to pre-pandemic levels.
According to USA Today, crime reported from nearly 6,000 institutions rose about 8% from 2019 to 2022, even though enrollments dipped during that timeframe.
Data from the U.S. Department of Education shows 35,121 criminal offenses were reported in 2019; 28,327 were reported in 2020; 31,368 were reported in 2021; and 38,302 were reported in 2022.
The jump in offenses directly coincides with students' post-pandemic return en masse to campuses and represents the largest increase since post-secondary institutions that receive federal funding began reporting campus safety statistics as required by the Clery Act of 1990, according to USA Today.
Reported offenses include homicides, sexual assault, robbery, burglary, auto theft, arson, and aggravated assault. Additionally, colleges and universities are mandated to report hate crimes and violence against women, as well as arrests and disciplinary actions.
According to the USA Today analysis, campus crimes remained "pretty stagnant" over the last decade and "dropped precipitously" in 2020 when in-person learning was replaced with online classrooms while we learned how to adjust to life with COVID-19.
The report contributes the spike in crime to a surge in motor vehicle thefts, "which more than doubled from 2019 and accounted for more than a quarter of offenses in 2022." But more vehicles weren't necessarily being stolen. Several schools have revised their reporting of vehicle thefts to also include scooters, electric bikes and golf carts, which could explain the rise, USA Today reported.
Experts say the recent spike is nothing to worry about -- that the numbers fall in line with historical data and are not unusually high. But parents can't seem to shake the data.
At the University of California, Berkeley, parents concerned about growing campus crimes took matters into their own hands and raised $40,000 to hire a private security guards to patrol near dorms and protect students at night.
"Our message to the University right now is, your students aren't safe and a small meaningful financial investment could turn that situation around so quickly," Sagar Jethani a father of two UC students, told KTVU.
The effort lasted for two weeks in March and the hope was that the school would continue to fund the program, but administrators declined, saying they would rather support the school's police force.
"Hiring private security raises a number of concerns including the training and experience of individuals hired by such firms," UC Berkeley said in a statement to KTVU. "We believe that University funds are better spent hiring more sworn or non-sworn UCPD officers."