U Alabama has less rapes (16 reported) then U of Arizona (36).
On that measure alone - U Alabama is 42K kids (I think including grad). U Arizona is a bit bigger 45K undergrad it says - not sure if all in Tucson.
But let’s just say they are like size.
If Bama has 16 of something and Arizona 36 and they are relatively like size, 16 is lower.
This is a school by school comparison.
But you are saying Tucson is 4x the size of Tuscaloosa - so really Alabama 16 is really like 64 in Tucson - so in actuality Arizona is better at 36.
But we are not comparing crime in Tuscaloosa vs. Tucson.
We are comparing crime at the U of Alabama vs. the U of Arizona.
Yes, not all crime is committed by students. But crime is likely committed mostly by people close to campus where in most large metro areas - you might have some folks 50 miles away.
Basically, I’m noting that the stats are school vs. the school. The school population is the denominator.
You are using the metro area - so NY, Chicago, LA get a huge discount vs. say Gainesville or Lincoln, NE, etc.
Housing in the Santa Barbara area is in short supply and extremely expensive. As a result, UCSB has built a lot of student housing. UCSB houses 40% of their students on campus. U Az houses 5%, 27% at Alabama, and 24% at UW. Even with a significantly smaller student enrollment, UCSB houses significantly more students than Arizona, and similar amounts to the other schools and significantly more upperclassmen, and graduate students (I’m on the move so numbers may be off, so best to fact check me). They have large family housing complexes as well, and they even house some staff.
So many variables go into these reports. I hope UCSB is doing everything possible to bring those numbers down, but sometimes you’re not comparing apples to apples.
38 (4237 * 0.9%) graduate/professional female students
5 (2501 * 0.2%) graduate/professional male students
experiencing non-consensual penetration (what most people would consider to be “rape”).
This total of 793 statistically-expected rapes is 49 times higher than the 16 reported rapes, suggesting that there may be vast underreporting (only 2% of statistically-expected rapes reported).
Also, differences in tendency to report may make a large difference in apparent rate, even though the underreporting may still be huge. Or, if every rape were reported, that college may have an apparent rate of rape that is 49 times higher than what may actually be reported at many colleges today.
That’s why I said earlier that it’s not that cut and dry and can be very contextual. If the campus is right in the middle of the metro area, then absolutely, yes, the number of people matter, regardless of whether they are or are not registered as students. Who cares about that? What matters is the size of the potential crime-causing population. If there is population density around the school, you are going to expect more crime generally. It would be like me saying you can’t count the car break-ins and theft in assessing crime at UW because those aren’t students. When someone steals your car, you don’t really care if they’re taking classes.
That’s my point. When you’re in a large metro area, there are a lot of people (students and non-students) in proximity to your campus. How can you evaluate the absolute number of anything that happens there w/o taking into account the total population in which the school finds itself?
My D attended Wesleyan, a school with 2,900 students in a town of about 50,000 people. If you told me Wes reported 203 car thefts, the same amount reported by a school with over 40,000 students in the middle of a 3.5 million person metro area, I’d conclude that Wesleyan (and Middletown) has a HUGE car theft problem that is much more severe than Seattle’s. In Seattle, those car thefts are being spread around. If there are 203 car thefts in Middletown, the odds of you having your car stolen are pretty high by comparison.
I’m no criminal lawyer, but I didn’t think city ordinances could trump state law for determining punishments for major offenses, which are determined at the state level.
Perusing the RCWs, theft or possession of a motor vehicle is a Class B felony, punishable by up to 10 years in prison and a fine of up to $20,000. Actual sentences are calculated using the state’s Sentencing Reform Act (RCW 9.94A), which requires judges to factor in the seriousness of the crime and the offender’s prior criminal history.
I’d be surprised if there is a hard and fast rule among the judges that require 7 convictions before jail time, though admittedly jail space is likely at a premium. I could be wrong.
Pretty much as I said. And that was before sociaists took over.
Seattle’s Car Theft Conviction Threshold for Jail Time
In Washington state, including Seattle, motor vehicle theft is a Class B felony under RCW 9A.56.065 app.leg.wa.gov. However, the state’s sentencing guidelines for repeat offenders have a specific threshold: it takes seven convictions for auto theft before an offender faces a one-year prison sentenceArs Technica.
How the threshold works
First-time offenders: The maximum sentence for a first offense is 0 to 60 days in jailArs Technica.
After seven convictions: The first time you hit that mark, the sentence can be up to 12 months in prison. In practice, with good time credits, that often reduces to about 8 monthsArs Technica.
The source you are linking is a chat room, and the only thing there is one poster saying that you need 7 convictions to go to jail for a year under the guidelines.
The only guideline worksheet I found was a little dated (2010) and that didn’t seem to indicate 7 convictions before you went to jail. In fact, it seems like you can go to jail, albeit not for a lengthy period, even after 1.
I’m not really arguing with you; I’m asking for some authority because, even for here, it sounds exceedingly permissive.
Well I lived there for 25 years and there was considerable discusssion of that policy and now it’s even more liberal and pro criminal. Have you heard the new Mayor??
The danger of driving is a valid point. But I’d add that the greatest danger is from impaired driving. The more spread out the college community is, the more danger of drunk driving. I went undergrad to a school where all off-campus housing was within 4 blocks of campus. No one drove on the weekends. Drank a lot, then walked. I think about that a lot now that I’m looking at schools for my own kids.
there is actually a huge variation in rates of death from driving in various states….it also has to do with infrastructure (including distance to high quality hospitals) and speed and teen driving instruction, not just impairment, I believe
“There were 40,901 deaths from motor vehicle crashes in the United States in 2023. This corresponds to 12.2 deaths per 100,000 people and 1.26 deaths per 100 million miles traveled. The fatality rate per 100,000 people ranged from 4.9 in Massachusetts to 24.9 in Mississippi. The death rate per 100 million miles traveled ranged from 0.56 in Massachusetts to 1.79 in Mississippi (Federal Highway Administration, 2025).”
Note, this is obviously not campus specific, but campuses are in states obviously and risk reduction is cumulative…..college age students often die from “misadventure” as one might say in the UK and accidents like this…
And, of course, depending on college, you are at almost zero risk as you won’t be in a car or much near them..
That’s super interesting especially since MA has high drinking rates. Supporting your contention that good emergency services/hospitals, good roads, good lighting - not to mention public transportation infrastructure may be more important.
Interesting. So must be that many residents buy into the idea of a designated driver. While Boston obviously has good public transit and ride shares much of the rest of the state does not so someone is driving home.
I added “or near them.” Some campuses have very few roads within them…. some are full of roads.
If you go to some SLACs or rural colleges, or some very contained campuses, you cross roads pretty infrequently, for example… I went to a college with pretty few real roads to get to class, and no roads where anyone was going over 30, and virtually no tractor-trailers or the like on them. That obviously can still cause major harm… but different from some schools where kids are crossing big roads all the time.
But if you are driving a lot, long distances in MS, for example, your risk starts getting higher over time than in MA, for instance, if driving a lot.
Anyway, that is getting very in the weeds, I concede! I think there is a correlation in many of these states to other things, too. There is a reason the same states rank highly for life expectancy overall… public health infrastructure is different difference places.. (and wealth and education levels correlate to other things too).
