Enrollment booms at colleges in Tennessee and Georgia have helped fuel a spike in campus crime rates, but officials say they are battling the trend by beefing up security and teaching students to protect themselves and their property.
“When you have more people on a campus, you have more opportunity for crime,” said Chuck Cantrell, a spokesman for the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. “A college campus is like a little city. Unfortunately, that means we have crime issues, as well. The real question is, how do you deal with it?”
The national recession has led more students to improve their skills through education. In Tennessee, enrollment has increased 10 percent since 2008. Georgia state universities and two-year colleges reported enrollment up 6.7 percent from last year.
More students also mean more theft, drugs, fraud and rape, according to a recent Tennessee Bureau of Investigation report.
Campus crime in Tennessee increased a little more than 9 percent from 2008 to 2009, the first increase in five years, according to the report.
There is no statewide campus crime report published by the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, and the University System of Georgia does not compile data from its 35 campuses, officials said.
Individual campuses report major crimes required by federal law. Schools in Tennessee and larger schools in Georgia report minor crimes.
At UTC, reports of theft and larceny increased from 138 in 2008 to 164 in 2009. The school had no forcible sex offenses in 2008 but three incidents in 2009. Drugs violations and assaults decreased, reports show.
“It is an unfortunate reality that we have to take responsibility for our own belongings,” said Mr. Cantrell. “We tell students, ‘Don’t leave your stuff. Don’t leave your calculator out in the library when you go to the bathroom.'”
The University of Georgia in Athens also showed an increase in larceny and theft of 6.3 percent, university records show. Bicycle thefts alone rose from seven to 27 in a year, records show.
Dalton State College, which has experienced record enrollment in the past few years, has reported no major crimes on its campus, but officials said there have been more thefts on campus since dorms were opened last fall.
Four officers were added to the school’s police force and have helped manage the larger student presence on campus, said Billy Gee, director of public safety at Dalton State College.
“We haven’t had a major increase,” said Mr. Gee. “The police presence and the increase in staff is what we really try to focus on.”
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