Sexual Assault, Burglary, & Aggravated Assault at largest PA Universities 

In analyzing reported statistics of these three crimes, it is clear that Penn State University performs significantly worse in campus safety and security as compared to the other four universities, with a steadily increasing rate of reported sexual misconduct since 2014 and a total of 164.5 per 100,000 students in 2018 (see Fig 1 of Crime Dashboard). Shockingly, reported sexual misconduct increased by 197% in the four-year period. This is particularly concerning as all other universities have improved upon their sexual assault statistics in recent years, although a closer look at reporting resources and support programs at each campus is needed to contextualize this value, since 85% of sexual assaults are unreported (Aiken, 2018). Penn State’s reputation among the other four universities for having a large culture surrounding fraternity socialization and binge drinking also positions its student body to be more vulnerable to sexual assault, as over half of reported sexual assaults involve alcohol (The Recovery Village & Deveney, 2020). In 2018, 88% of reported sexual assaults at Penn State involved alcohol use (Aiken, 2018). At the other end of the spectrum, Drexel University and Temple University in Philadelphia had relatively low rates of reported sexual misconduct in 2018, with 20.3 and 32.7 incidents per 100,000 respectively. For comparison, the national rate of rape per 100,000 people in 2018 totaled to 44 reports (US DOJ, 2018).

Similarly, Penn State remains a stark leader in average rates of burglary (84.54 per 100,000), despite being the only campus not located in an urban area. In fact, a 2020 study of crime on American campuses found that, contrary to popular belief, rural or suburban campuses are not necessarily safer than urban campuses: among the top 20 safest campuses, only one was a rural college (Hurst, 2020). U Penn and Penn State match each other in relatively high rates of aggravated assault, with 20.74 and 20.29 average assaults per 100,000 students, respectively (see Figure 2 on Crime Dashboard). 

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The schools with the lowest annual average rates of burglary and aggravated assault out of the five universities are the University of Pittsburgh (18.15 burglaries) and Temple University (7.7 aggravated assaults). Despite these low rates of aggravated assault at Temple University in Philadelphia, it has the second highest incidence of burglaries at 53.59 burglaries. This may suggest that the university’s buildings lack security on its Philadelphia campus but has better policies and resources to prevent physical altercations that lead to assaults. The national average statistics per 100,000 people were 242.6 for aggravated assault and 461.7 for burglary from 2014-2018, suggesting that despite the presence of these crimes on campuses in both urban and rural environments, universities are still far more secure than non-campus living environments (US DOJ, 2018). An overarching caveat to examining university crime statistics discussed in class is that this analysis only accounts for on-campus crimes, rather than the surrounding jurisdictions where most students actually live and are members of society. Therefore, crime rates among university student populations are likely much higher than indicated in this report, particularly since off campus apartments may be less secure than on campus dorms, which tend to have security codes or student-ID swipe access and do not allow alcohol and drug use, which are main contributors to crime and sexual assault.

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In conclusion, a closer examination of communities around universities is necessary to make holistic conclusions about safety, but it is clear that Penn State has the least safe campus in terms of these three crimes, while Drexel and Pitt are the safest among Pennsylvania’s largest institutions.