ABSTRACT
Planning for the safety of a campus community in a complex and sometimes violent world creates many challenges for colleges and universities across a nation. The types of threatening situations that may be encountered at a particular location also determine safety plan components. In an overview of campus safety plans, common elements have emerged that take into consideration sources of threats, targets of threats, and type of intervention needed. Campus safety “programs” emerge as an outgrowth of safety plans to provide proactive efforts for preventing and responding to crisis situations. Local and regional environments harbor other dangers that threaten personal safety on a smaller, but nonetheless disconcerting scale. In examining the overall content of comprehensive safety plans, some general observations can be made. As colleges and universities review their established safety plans and attempt to develop more comprehensive designs that accommodate the complexity of today’s tenuous environments, information gleaned from other institutions can be quite helpful.
