Campus safety concerns discussed

Officials took questions from an audience whose main concern was campus safety during the year's first "Straight From the Source" event Tuesday.

The event, hosted by the Undergraduate Student Government, is an open question-and-answer session available to all students. Organized by Donald Clive Richards, Student Affairs Chair for USG, Straight From the Source hosts various administrative officials at the University of Connecticut who lend themselves to clarify questions students may have.

After this past weekend's events, safety emerged as the overlying theme to the evening. Mary Lorenz, a USG justice, directly questioned why the safety alert was sent out so late after this weekend's attempted sexual assault. Lorenz painted a frightening picture of the attacker milling around Carriage House looking for another unsuspecting victim since no notification was sent until the next afternoon.

Barry Feldman, the vice president and chief operating officer for the university, explained the situation was unavoidable since state police, not university police, were handling the crime. Before any information could be made public, state police were required to conduct extensive interviews to verify facts and hold a large-scale canine search of the premises.

"We were happy to just receive as much information as we did from the officers," Feldman said.

In regards to safety, other members of USG and the general student body had questions about the lack of blue-light phones in Mansfield Apartments, door propping in Northwest Residential Halls and an unreliable bus system.

Another topic of discussion was UConn's national reputation as both a party school and as a strong academic environment. Thomas Haggerty, the president of USG, asked the administration present what was being done to better UConn's national ranking.

"The first place people look to when applying or evaluating schools in U.S. News and World Report. Obviously our national ranking is disappointing," Haggerty said.

While UConn is the top-ranked public university in New England, it is ranked 66th nationally.

Feldman, the Vice Provost for Undergraduate Education Veronica Makowsky and Vice President for Student Affairs John Saddlemire all said serious efforts were being made to continue improving UConn's reputation.

"When there's a majority of negative press about the institution, it's a debilitating factor for raising money," Haggerty said. "How much effort does it take to make a press release? Fifteen positive seconds on a news network makes a huge difference."

As the economy continues to remain stagnant, concerned students voiced their qualms with budget cuts at the university.

"More cuts isn't anything a student wants to hear right now," Haggerty said.

Lia Albini, vice president of USG, asked whether efforts were being made to establish more night classes in order for students to manage a job and studies. While night class additions are still in progress, many more internet classes have been established for students in this situation.

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Correction: The printed version of this story calls UConn "the top-ranked university in New England," when UConn is in fact the top-ranked public university in New England. The Daily Campus apologizes for any confusion this error may have caused.