Armed Guards on 'Peace' Campuses Debated

At Earlham College, a Quaker-related school of 1,200 students in Richmond, Ind., a security review occurred even before the Virginia Tech massacre. Campus security director Cathy Anthofer was hired in 2007 to help the school with emergency management. She said Earlham's likeliest emergency would be caused by weather, not violence.

"We've defined what an emergency is on our campus," Anthofer said. "Earlham is not a reactive institution."

Anthofer cited a good relationship between the Earlham campus and local law enforcement. "The chief of police of our local department graduated from Earlham," said Mark Blackmon, Earlham's director of media relations. "He understands where we are on this issue."

Though the shootings at Virginia Tech and Northern Illinois University garnered public attention, evidence shows that campuses have generally become safer.

In crime statistics released in February from the U.S. Department of Justice, campus crime rates decreased over 10 years in every category of crime -- including violent crime -- with the exception of sexual assault. "Campuses are safer than the general population," said Christopher G. Blake, associate director of the International Association of Campus Law Enforcement Administrators.

Blake said that while he knows of no organization that is tracking moves toward armed security, his group has been consulted by a number of colleges and universities in the process of arming their security forces.

Campus shootings are not the only factor driving the discussions; rapid response to emergencies is shifting away from SWAT teams, which take time to assemble, to a police response that emphasizes speed. "The new paradigm is to try to engage the shooter right away," Blake said.

In their security reviews, a number of colleges also examined preventive strategies and emergency response that could employ nonlethal force, such as Tasers. From that perspective, a school's moral and legal responsibility to ensure safety does not necessarily require guns.

"There may be other nonviolent alternatives officers could use," said Donald B. Kraybill, senior fellow at the Young Center for Anabaptist and Pietist Studies at Elizabethtown College, a Brethren-related school in Lancaster County, Pa.

"I would hope that colleges in the peace church tradition have the brainpower to come up with creative nonviolent alternatives."