We all make jokes about how inept the legendary bureaucracy of our school can be (financial aid, I’m looking at you).
Often, students around campus poke fun at how distant some of our administrators can be as well (what does President Wright look like, anyway?).
However, as funny as making fun of our administration can be, the distance and incompetence could mean something much more sinister for Prairie View students than mean-spirited jokes.
Take the incident last week when a student was stabbed on campus.
Hours after the initial attack took place, the police had completely locked down the school.
Many students had their cars searched on the way out of campus (mine included) and, when we asked why the campus was locked down, the police were completely tight-lipped.
This may not seem like a big deal since no one else was hurt, but what if the situation was more dire? Did not the Virginia Tech campus security fail to notify the student body when they had a weapon-wielding mentally imbalanced student on the loose? What if a similar situation had occurred during the Oct. 5 incident?
The police are not the only ones guilty of failing the students in this regard.
The entire weekend, rumors flew about the school, and eventually people had passed around reports of shootings, deaths, and multiple stabbing incidents.
All of this nonsense would have been solved easily had the campus police or administrators simply told the students what the situation was.
Days after the initial rumors were settled, I had a hard time straightening out the facts for a news article and I’m a reporter; imagine how difficult it would have been if I had been an average student concerned about my safety?
I’m not just a person who complains without offering ways to solve the problem; I suggest the administration can distribute information through a couple of ways.
The administrators can put out e-mails to students (or adopt the methods of other schools and notify students through MySpace and Facebook), or could simply be more vocal about the problems and issues of students.
I suppose what I’m calling for isn’t necessarily just security-specific, either.
Perhaps I merely do not know how the “college system” is supposed to work, but I don’t think administration takes an active role in actually addressing the issues of student life.
Safety is a serious issue that is being ignored on campus, and, although I do realize the administration is probably very busy (I’m sure losing all of our paperwork takes a lot of time out of your day), I think they can do a little bit more to notify students of issues that occur on campus.