Editorial: Security improvements

On October 16, a female student in Wannamaker was attacked in her hall's bathroom by a man trying to sexually assault her. Unfortunately, this is not the only bathroom attack Duke has experienced--last spring, a freshman woman reported being sexual assaulted in a Randolph bathroom.

In the wake of this latest incident, which has stoked the fears of female students across campus, the administration has decided to change the locks on all the bathroom doors, limiting women's restroom access to female students and men's restrooms access to male students.

While changing the bathroom locks is a good first step for increased safety, there are other measures the administration should consider that would also vastly improve safety within the dorms and hopefully prevent horrible incidents like this in the future.

Although it remains unclear whether the most recent attacker was a student, by changing the bathroom locks to single-sex access, future attacks that could possibly be perpetrated by students would be prevented. Also, by limiting access to the bathrooms, the administration will reitrate the fact that bathroom doors should always be kept locked for safety purposes.

One of the most important things that the administration can do to improve safety around campus is to hold mandatory information sessions during and after orientation emphasising what sort of actions students should take to be safe. If safe behavior such as locking bathrooms, not proping open doors and not allowing people to tailgate into the dorms is ingrained in students from the day they matriculate at Duke, such behavior will become second-nature and safety will improve.

As it stands now, students will probably continue to be cautious in the wake of this most recent attack for a few weeks. However, in order to truly improve safety on campus, students must continue to be aware and continue to ensure safety for months and years in the future--safety must never be out of students' minds.

The lock changes, however, are just a first step. While they would help to prevent certain types of attacks, more serious security measures are needed to deter crime in a larger sense.

For one, the University should seriously consider placing video cameras in dorms to record any possible criminals. While there are valid privacy concerns involved with video cameras, the benefits of preventing rape outweigh these concerns, especially if the cameras are strategically located in public places like the entrace to the dorm, in the stairwells or in the bathroom entrances.