Campus Crime – A Guide for Student Safety from SafetyGirl.com

Books, clothes, music, refrigerator, cash?  These are all important items to remember when our thoughts turn to “back to school”.  We should also be thinking about campus safety.  College campuses are not isolated from criminal activity.  In fact, you may be surprised to find that the following are the average crime statistics for our nation’s campuses, each year.

Data source www.ope.ed.gov

Rest assured that the majority of these crimes are preventable.  So just how can your son or daughter enjoy the college experience without becoming one of these gruesome statistics?  Here are a few tips:

1)      Awareness.  Be aware of everything around you.  Most victims have a sense that something isn’t right just before a crime occurs.  Trust that gut feeling and act, by engaging one of your personal defense strategies.  Personal music players are great, but also detach you from reality.  Criminals want to catch you by surprise, and target victims that are not paying attention to their surroundings.  Keep your wits about you, at all times, and you will see trouble coming from a long way off.

2)      Don’t go it alone.  No matter if you are big, small, fast, or slow, you should always travel with at least one companion.  This is especially important at night, or in remote areas.  Criminals look for easy targets, and a pair or group of people does not present that.  Walking with a friend is far more secure than going it alone, and the conversation will make the journey fun!

3)      Have a plan!!!  Did you ever hear the phrase “if you fail to plan, you plan to fail”?  This is especially true in self defense.  Your plan should include a fully charged cell phone, pepper spray, personal alarm, and when to turn your plan into action.

4)      Practice.  Personal defense tools, like pepper spray and stun guns, are powerful and could save you from becoming a victim.  Don’t trust that you will be able to figure out how these tools work, during a crisis situation.  You should practice pepper spray deployment several times, with inert spray, so that if you need to defend yourself, you will know what to do.  SafetyGirl.com is a great source for live pepper spray, inert practice spray, and kits that include both products and targets.  Be prepared!

5)      Remember that pepper spray has an expiration date.  Replace yours prior to that date, so that you can be assured the maximum protection, should you need it.

Brian Cerra is a recognized personal protection expert, and President of Operations for Online Stores, Inc.