Campus Safety & Security

Three students who survived a shooting are suing Brown University for negligent security and premises liability, among other charges, saying the institution made it too easy for a former student to walk into a school auditorium during exam preparation and open fire with a semiautomatic weapon.

“Notwithstanding its location within an open, urban campus environment, [engineering building] Barus and Holly was open and accessible without meaningful entry restriction, and neither the building generally nor [shooting location] Tanner Auditorium specifically was protected by secured-entry measures requiring individualized authorization for ingress,” the complaints say. “Students and non-students alike were free to enter and move through the building without meaningful restriction.”

Cláudio Manuel Neves Valente attended the school as a physics graduate student in the early 2000s. Officials allege he killed two students and injured nine on Dec. 13. Police found him dead by apparent suicide a few days later at a Salem, New Hampshire, self-storage facility.

The students accuse the university of failing to provide building access control, surveillance and monitoring, among other security measures, in a breach of its duty to maintain reasonably safe premises.  

“A significant portion of Brown's campus, including Barus and Holley, is not a closed or self-contained campus physically separated from the surrounding East Side neighborhood of Providence,” say the complaints, which the students filed anonymously. “Rather, it is integrated into that neighborhood, with public streets, sidewalks, and non-university buildings in close proximity to and interspersed with university facilities. As a result, Barus and Holley was readily accessible from public areas and was not physically segregated from the surrounding community.”

The school was also negligent for disregarding concerns raised by one of the school’s custodians, Derek Lisi, who reported his concern that Valente was acting suspiciously by examining the building and auditorium about a dozen times before the incident.  

“During these encounters, [Lisi] observed Valente pacing hallways, peering into classrooms, and moving in and out of bathrooms,” the complaints say. “Lisi reported this suspicious activity to Brown campus security. In particular, Lisi reported that the individual appeared to be surveilling or ‘casing’ the building.”

People showing up repeatedly to a site without having apparent business there is a red flag from a security standpoint, Michael Evanoff, chief security officer of cloud-based security company Verkada, said in an email. “Would-be attackers often scout locations in advance,” he said. “Identifying suspicious behavior early is where proactive security teams can have the greatest impact.”

Best practices for spotting people who might be scouting a location are trained personnel and cameras, Evanoff said. “Both trained personnel and camera infrastructure with analytics … can flag anomalies in real time,” he said. 

The complaints said the school only had two exterior cameras and no interior cameras pointing toward the auditorium or the hallways surrounding it. 

“Neither the building generally nor Tanner Auditorium specifically was protected by secured-entry measures,” the complaints said. 

In an emailed statement, Brown University spokesperson Brian Clark said the school was reviewing the complaints carefully and promptly. 

“Out of respect for the privacy interests of the plaintiffs, we have no details to share on the merits of the litigation at this time,” Clark said. 

The person who killed two people and injured nine in the Dec. 13 shooting at Brown University didn’t appear to have a hard time accessing the first-floor lecture hall in the Barus and Holley engineering and physics building, reports show. 

The building had few security cameras in the area outside the classroom, and the doors were unlocked, according to reports. 

“He went in basically without anyone noticing anything,” Thomas Verdi, a former Providence chief of police who now oversees the city’s revenue department, said in a Providence Journal report. “He … knew the building. He knew the area. And I would not be surprised if he was a student, former student, worker.”

“There just weren't a lot of cameras in that Brown building,” Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Neronha said in a separate Providence Journal report. He described the seven-story building where the shooting took place as “an old building attached to a new one.” The building was renovated in 2013 and has more than 100 laboratories and just as many classrooms and offices, according to information on the renovations. 

Although the building was open, students needed to scan badges to access classrooms and labs, school officials said. But hall traffic on that Saturday afternoon was unusually heavy because of the number of students either taking exams or preparing for them, according to reports. 

“The shooting occurred during one of the busiest moments of the academic calendar,” Politico reported.

There was "probably a lot of traffic," Brown University Provost Francis Doyle said in an NPR report.

The shooting site is a lecture hall with tiered rows of seats. 

“The room has stadium seating with doors that enter at the top,” said Rachel Friedberg, a professor whose teaching assistant was conducting an exam review for one of her economics classes when the gunman accessed the room. The teaching assistant told her that the gunman “came in the doors, yelled something – he couldn't remember what he yelled – and started shooting,” Friedberg said in an Ocean State Media report.

Students started scrambling to get away, Friedberg said. They were “trying to get lower down in the stadium seating.”

One of Friedberg’s classes, Principles of Economics, is the most heavily attended class at Brown, taken by half of the undergraduate students, according to Frieberg’s university biography page.  

The New York Times identified the teaching assistant as Joseph Oduro. “The students in the middle were impacted the most,” Oduro told the Times. “Many of them were lying there and they were not moving. I have no idea how many.”

A person of interest identified the day after the shooting has been released. Officials have not publicly disclosed any other suspect. Closed circuit television images that officials released show a person dressed in black walking away from the campus. 

The incident is one of at least 75 school shootings in the U.S. this year, CNN reported. As of Dec. 13, there have been at least 392 mass shootings and 13,955 shooting deaths nationwide, CNN reported based on data from Gun Violence Archive.

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By TouchNet

Safety and security consistently rank among the top priorities for higher education institutions. Students who do not feel safe cannot fully engage in academic life, damaging their experience and your institution’s bottom line. Yet with limited operating budgets and the rapid pace of innovation, it can be a challenge to know where to invest to improve campus security. Leaders are often forced to chase a moving target, asking themselves, how can we ensure the highest levels of student safety without chasing every new technology trend?

Oftentimes the answer is not to spend more, but to think differently about what you already have. In fact, the solution might already be sitting in your students’ wallets or stored securely on their phones: the campus ID.

With the right strategy, you can turn one of the most ubiquitous items on campus into your biggest resource. Campus IDs are a powerful, integrated security asset that improves physical safety, strengthens data security, reduces administrative burden, and enhances the overall student experience. Institutions like Mount Holyoke College, Sheridan College, and North Idaho College offer compelling proof that campus ID systems can deliver measurable security and financial value, without requiring campuses to reinvent the wheel.

Campus safety is foundational to student success

Campus safety is not a “nice to have.” It is foundational to student well‑being, retention, and success. Students who worry about their physical safety or gaining access to the right buildings are less likely to attend events, use late‑night study spaces, or take advantage of campus resources.

From a leadership perspective, safety failures also have downstream financial impacts like liability exposure, reputational damage, and enrollment consequences. For business officers, effective safety strategies must balance risk mitigation, cost control, and operational efficiency. The campus ID can be an essential piece in this safety and security puzzle.

Why campus IDs are the missing key in campus security systems

Use what you already have

Higher education budgets are under sustained pressure, making it essential to maximize return on existing investments. Campus ID systems already touch nearly every student, faculty, and staff member. Rather than adding isolated security solutions, institutions can strategically reimagine their campus IDs as the backbone of access control and monitoring.

At Mount Holyoke College, integrating wireless locks with their campus ID system has been transformational. Doug Vanderpoel, who oversees auxiliary technology, describes the philosophy plainly. “We’re trying to keep ahead of the bad guys,” Vanderpoel says. “We moved to wireless solutions around 2007, and we’ve been adding ever since. We were one of the first to do the wireless locksets. We saw the benefit of that from an infrastructure standpoint and a master key coordination piece.”

Rather than layering on disconnected tools, Mount Holyoke leveraged its ID system to modernize access across nearly 10,000 doors on an 800‑acre campus, proof that forward progress does not always require starting from scratch.

Make existing infrastructure work harder

Many campus ID software providers integrate directly with existing electronic locks and security platforms. This reduces both capital expenses and labor costs associated with managing separate systems. Administrators can issue credentials, manage permissions, and respond to incidents from a centralized platform, saving time while improving accuracy and accountability.

As Mount Holyoke’s experience shows, this approach also simplifies operations over time. Entire residence halls now operate without mechanical keys, with access handled exclusively through campus IDs.

Meeting students where they are

One credential, many uses

Students already rely on their campus IDs daily access dining services, attend events, or make purchases. Extending that same credential to serve as a secure access key reduces friction for students and staff alike. Fewer cards. Fewer keys. Fewer points of confusion.

Sheridan College offers a powerful example of how leveraging campus IDs improves both experience and safety. As Associate Director of Business Services Projects and Campus Card Aesha Brown explains, “We wanted to meet students where they are at.” By enabling mobile campus IDs for Apple and Android, Sheridan turned students’ phones into secure, encrypted access credentials. This approach did more than improve convenience, it removed barriers for part‑time students who come to campus outside traditional office hours and still need secure access to services.

From a security standpoint, simplicity matters. The fewer credentials a student has to manage, the more likely they are to use them correctly. A single campus ID—physical or mobile—reduces lost keys and requests for emergency access assistance, keeping student experience high and reducing staff workloads.

Convenience for institutions and students

Campus IDs also improve convenience on the institutional side. Administrators can issue, update, or revoke access remotely without rekeying buildings or tracking hundreds of physical keys. This is especially valuable for managing student employment, research teams, athletic groups, or residential transitions. For example, if a robotics team uses a workshop with expensive equipment, access can be limited to active members only. If a student leaves the team, access can be removed immediately—no key retrieval required.

How campus IDs improve physical security

Campus safety encompasses two major areas: physical security and data security. Campus IDs strengthen both.

On the physical side, integrated ID systems allow institutions to monitor and log activity across campus. Administrators can see where access attempts occur, identify repeated attempts to enter restricted areas, and respond quickly to incidents.

At Mount Holyoke, their ID system enables real‑time monitoring of access points and sensors across campus. This helps campus police and facilities teams respond quickly when something unusual occurs. Integrated systems also allow for rapid lockdowns or permission changes when needed, coordinated across residence halls, academic buildings, labs, and dining facilities.

How campus IDs improve data security

From a financial leadership perspective, data security is inseparable from physical security. Integrated campus ID systems enforce consistency across processes, platforms, and policies, reducing exposure to cyber risk.

Today’s campus IDs and mobile credentials use encryption, comply with PCI standards for payments, and can support multi‑factor authentication or biometric safeguards. Because all access and credentialing flows through a single, integrated system, institutions benefit from standardized controls and clearer audit trails.

Leverage integrations to improve operational efficiency

Finding a campus ID system that integrates with your existing security infrastructure can reduce operational and budgetary strain. Tammy Robertson, Senior Systems Analyst/Programmer at North Idaho College, explains that their campus ID system integrates “...with our student information system. Other software didn’t allow that. It makes everything so much simpler.”

When access systems integrate directly with student information systems, permissions can update automatically based on enrollment status, employment changes, or disciplinary actions. For CFOs and business officers, “simpler” translates directly into lower labor costs, a consolidated tech stack, reduced risk, and stronger compliance.

Robertson also highlights how integration improves visibility and control, “Whether you need to track activity on campus or integrate access into buildings, [our ID system] is designed to bolster campus security.”

A strategic asset hiding in plain sight

For higher education leaders, campus IDs represent a rare opportunity: a tool that simultaneously improves safety and student experience. Rather than chasing the newest security trend, institutions can reimagine their existing tools to make a bigger impact.

Mount Holyoke College, Sheridan College, and North Idaho College prove that campus IDs deliver measurable benefits in safety, efficiency, and satisfaction. For financial leaders tasked with doing more with less, the campus ID is not just an operational tool. It is a strategic security investment hiding in plain sight.

Want to learn more about how to leverage your campus ID to improve the safety and security of your campus? See how TouchNet can help.

Texas policymakers in September launched state House and Senate select committees tasked with issuing reports about “bias, discourse, and freedom of speech” on the state’s college campuses. Each chamber's panel includes five Republican and two Democratic legislators. 

Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick linked the new committees to the Sept. 10 murder of right-wing commentator and political organizer Charlie Kirk. “He was assassinated for simply expressing his First Amendment rights,” Patrick said in a Sept. 12 statement. “Those who cheered his murder are also cheering for the death of America.”

Texas has garnered national attention in recent weeks over high-profile firings of college faculty members over their teaching and politics, as well as a new state law explicitly banning all First Amendment-protected activities on public college campuses at certain times.

Kirk’s murder on Utah Valley University's campus has intensified an already fraught and tangled debate around free speech at colleges. Prosecutors on Tuesday charged a 22-year-old man with aggravated murder and began releasing some details about the suspect.

State Rep. Dustin Burrows, speaker of the Texas House, said in a statement Friday that “the public celebration of his murder by some in higher education” is “appalling and reveals a deeper, systemic problem worth examining.”

Texas' new committees, the House and Senate Select Committees on Civil Discourse & Freedom of Speech in Higher Education, represent an intensifying scrutiny of speech on the state's campuses.

A press release out of Patrick’s office said the committees' work would “help ensure Texas remains a national leader in protecting First Amendment rights.” 

But national free speech groups have recently raised alarms about suppression of speech and expression in the state. 

The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression is suing the University of Texas System system over a new state law directing public colleges to prohibit students’ expressive activities — defined as those protected by the First Amendment and its counterpart in the state constitution — on campuses from 10 p.m. to 8 a.m daily.

FIRE earlier this month called the law “blatantly unconstitutional” and said it could inhibit student journalism, religious expression, discussing the wrong topics or even wearing certain T-shirts in that 10-hour time frame.

Last week, Texas A&M University fired a children’s literature professor and removed a department head and dean from their administrative positions after a state representative shared a video of the instructor teaching about gender identity. 

Meanwhile, last Wednesday Texas State University fired a tenured history professor who spoke at an online socialist forum about organizing working classes against capitalism and alluded vaguely to a hypothetical “overthrow” of the U.S. without elaborating. 

In a statement last week, Texas State President Kelly Damphousse said the professor’s actions “amounted to serious professional and personal misconduct” and alleged that he had incited violence. However, Damphousse didn’t provide details about what the professor said or go deeper into his incitement allegations. 

An attorney for the professor described his ouster as “politically motivated discrimination” and said he would be taking legal action, according to the Texas Tribune.

Meanwhile, as many from across the political spectrum have pled for civility and an end to political violence in the wake of Kirk’s death, several faculty members across the country have been fired for negative comments and social media posts about Kirk that administrators deemed inappropriate.

Clemson University in South Carolina fired two faculty members this week over their posts. Prior to the terminations, some politicians called for the institution to be defunded or for students to request refunds, according to Greenville News. 

Austin Peay State University, a public institution in Tennessee, fired a theater professor last week for social media comments that university President Mike Licari described to local news outlets as “insensitive, disrespectful and interpreted by many as propagating justification for unlawful death.”

At both universities, leaders did not quote the comments or specify the parts they deemed inappropriate or in violation of their institution's policies. 

In Texas, a student at Texas Tech University was arrested and expelled for taunting mourners at a Charlie Kirk memorial and allegedly hitting another student on the head, according to media reports. In a statement, the university said that “any behavior that denigrates victims of violence is reprehensible, has no place on our campus, and does not align with our values."

The shooter who killed Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk Wednesday on the Utah Valley University campus appeared to fire from the roof of a university building that houses administrative offices and student advisement services.  

The Losee Center for Student Success is a 90,000-square-foot building with a mix of campus offices and student services that underwent a $4.5 million renovation in 2009. The building is fewer than 200 yards from the outdoor amphitheater where Kirk was speaking. A video taken by an attendee captures images of what appears to be the shooter standing on the roof of the building after the shooting and running away. 

“The rooftop to the Losee building is pretty easy to access,” a CNN reporter said in a video analysis of the shooting. “It’s connected to another building by an elevated walkway, which … is only separated from the roof by a railing.” 

Because of the distance and accuracy of the shot, it was likely fired from a large-caliber rifle, Jim Cavanaugh, a former officer of the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, said on MSNBC show The Beat with Ari Melber. “It does appear to be a large rifle round,” Cavanaugh said. “I would call it a .308 or a .30-06, like a deer rifle. One shot. That’s all.”

Cavanaugh explained that “Snipers use that attack method for two reasons. One, they can’t get close … and secondly, because you want to get away. That gives you the distance to get away. You can fire the round and then egress from the scene.” 

“Two hundred yards is not a difficult rifle shot,” Christopher O’Leary, former director of hostage recovery for the federal government, told Melber. “Most people have optics on their weapon. … With a true optic on it, 200 yards is very easy to do.”

The university, in Orem, Utah, prohibits guns on campus to the extent allowed by state law. Utah’s Concealed Weapons Law allows people with a state concealed carry permit to be on campus with a concealed firearm, according to the campus police website.

An estimated 3,000 people were attending the Kirk event, the first of a series of campus talks the conservative activist was scheduled to hold around the country. Kirk was shot while answering a question about mass shootings. “Do you know how many mass shootings in America there have been over the last 10 years?” an attendee asked, the CNN video analysis shows. “Counting or not counting gang violence?” Kirk responded before he was hit.   

Local police and half a dozen campus police officers provided security at the event, but there was no screening, the CNN analysis said.  

“Let’s be realistic,” O’Leary said on The Beat. “We’re not going to lock down a college campus for every speaker outdoors. Maybe you want to take it indoors. I think that’s all going to be assessed moving forward.”  

Phil Lyman, a former Utah state legislator who was at the event, said on The Beat that he saw what he believed were “a lot of undercover police officers running around” after the shooting, which surprised him. “I would not have thought that [those were officers].”

The campus is closed for the week while law enforcement officials conduct their forensic work. 

Several historically Black colleges and universities locked down and canceled classes in fall 2025 after receiving threats to campus safety, according to notices from campus officials and media reports. 

The affected institutions include Alabama State, Bethune-Cookman, Clark Atlanta, Hampton, Southern and Virginia State universities. 

Alabama State canceled all campus activities Sept. 11 after receiving a “terroristic threat,” according to media reports. Although university and law enforcement officials issued an all-clear notice in the afternoon, the institution said it remained closed to the public and asked on-campus students to keep sheltering in place. 

At least four of Georgia’s HBCUs likewise locked down after Clark Atlanta University received a threat, according to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Each institution — which included Spelman and Morehouse colleges — lifted their lockdown orders by early afternoon. 

In Virginia, at least two institutions also received threats. 

Hampton said it would halt all nonessential activities through Sept. 12 after getting “notice of a potential threat,” according to a social media post from the institution. 

Virginia State likewise went into lockdown as law enforcement investigated “the credibility of the threat” it received Thursday, the university said on social media. Later that day, Virginia State President Makola Abdullah said the lockdown had been lifted. 

“To those who seek to silence or scare us: we will not be intimidated,” Abdullah said. “For over a century, Virginia State University and other HBCUs have stood as a beacon of knowledge, excellence, and resilience. Today’s events only reaffirm our commitment to providing a safe and empowering environment for our students, faculty, and staff.”

Southern University, in Louisiana, late on Sept. 11 lifted the lockdown order imposed following a “campus safety threat,” it said in a social media post. However, the university canceled all classes and campus activities through the weekend. 

In Florida, Bethune-Cookman officials canceled classes due to a “potential threat to campus safety,” it said in a social media post. The university ordered employees on campus to head home and others to work remotely. It also advised students to shelter in place in their dorms. 

Police gave the all-clear notice for the campus in the early afternoon, The Daytona Beach-News Journal reported. 

On the other side of the state, Florida A&M University had not received a threat but was monitoring the situation, it said in a social media post. “We stand in solidarity with institutions currently under lockdown or threat and extend our support during this time,” it added. 

In early 2022, HBCUs received waves of bomb threats that forced them to lock down their campuses and cancel classes. Later that year, the U.S. Department of Justice said it identified a juvenile it believed to be behind what it called racially motivated threats. 

The September 2025 threats came just one day after conservative activist Charlie Kirk was fatally shot in the neck on Utah Valley University’s campus during an event that drew some 3,000 attendees.

Northwestern University on Monday touted an 88% year-over-year decline in complaints of antisemitic discrimination or harassment as of November 2024. 

Over the past year, the Illinois university said it has intensified its efforts to crack down on antisemitism. Officials now require all students and employees to take antisemitism training, and they tightened the rules around demonstrations and increased the police presence on campus.

The announcement comes less than a month after the U.S. Department of Education named Northwestern among 60 colleges facing federal probes over allegations of antisemitism. However, the scrutiny into Northwestern predates President Donald Trump's second election. 

Last May, the Republican-led House Committee on Education and Workforce opened an investigation into the university's handling of pro-Palestinian protests and cases of alleged antisemitism. And in October, the committee accused Northwestern and 10 other high-profile colleges of failing to protect Jewish students from antisemitism. 

The committee's report alleged that the university made undue concessions to pro-Palestinian protesters who had set up an encampment on campus during the spring term. In one example, it said a professor appointed to negotiate with student activists instead advised them "on how to pressure trustees to advance divestment.”

Over the past year, Northwestern has put new safeguards in place to better protect Jewish students, it said Monday.

The university's new antisemitism trainings, created in collaboration with the pro-Israel Jewish United Fund, "will continue as a permanent part of our broader training in civil rights and Title IX," the report said.

Northwestern also added a new intimidation standard to its conduct code in September, barring students from subjecting people or groups to "abusive, demeaning, harassing, humiliating, intimidating, threatening or violent behavior that substantially affects the ability of the person or group to learn, work or live in the University environment.”

Addressing protests, the university rolled out policies limiting when and how people could display banners, distribute and hang flyers, and erect structures such as tents on campus.

"Although, as a private institution, Northwestern is not legally bound by the First Amendment, our new policies are fully consistent with Constitutional values as reasonable time, place and manner rules," the report said.

In February, Northwestern also adopted the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s definition of antisemitism. The month prior, Trump directed federal agencies to weigh the definition when enforcing civil rights law, reaffirming an executive order he issued during his first term.

However, the academic behind the definition said he never intended for his work to be applied to speech on college campuses. And critics of its widespread adoption argue that some of the definition's examples of antisemitism — such as saying “the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavor” and comparing “contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis” — infringe on free speech.

This academic year, Northwestern sanctioned 11 students for violating its demonstration and display policies, with punishments ranging from warnings to multi-month disciplinary probation.

The university also said it terminated a staff member for employee policy violations. On Tuesday, a university spokesperson declined to elaborate, saying "per University policy, we do not comment on personnel matters."

‘A political hit job’

Northwestern’s update comes as one of its professor faces termination following his involvement in a pro-Palestinian protest last year.

Steven Thrasher, an HIV/AIDS scholar and a journalism professor at Northwestern, said late last month that the university had denied his bid for tenure and terminated him effective August 2026.

A Northwestern spokesperson declined to comment Tuesday, citing university policy.

Thrasher, who holds a social justice reporting chair, participated in a student-led pro-Palestinian demonstration on Northwestern's campus in April 2024. At that event, he was one of at least three professors arrested for "obstructing a police officer." Thrasher, in turn, alleged the campus police assaulted him.

The charges against him were ultimately dropped, but Northwestern suspended Thrasher amid an investigation into his actions opened last year. In January, Thrasher said the disciplinary committee cleared him. However, he said the administration had opened a second investigation.

Thrasher asserted that his termination and tenure rejection are "a political hit job over my support for Palestine" and unrelated to the quality of his work.

Thrasher is still employed at the university. But students registered for his class got a last-minute notice this week saying it was canceled, the Evanston Roundtable reported. 

On Sunday, over 100 current and former Northwestern students published an open letter condemning Thrasher's looming termination.

"We see this move as a disturbing concession to rising authoritarian forces that actively pose an existential threat," they wrote in the Daily Northwestern.

Mounting scrutiny from legislators

Along with the Trump administration’s investigation, Northwestern is facing intensifying scrutiny from House lawmakers. 

On Thursday, Republican leaders of the House education committee sent a letter to Northwestern leaders accusing the university of supporting "illegal, antisemitic conduct" by representing pro-Palestinian protesters and demonstrators. The letter also raised broader concerns with the clinics, saying Northwestern Law is funding "left-wing advocacy with its institutional resources."

Lawmakers gave Northwestern until April 10 to turn over "all written policies, procedures, and guidance relating to the function" of its legal clinic, as well as all "hiring materials and performance reviews" for one of the clinic directors.

A spokesperson for Northwestern said Tuesday its law school's legal clinic operates within the standards set by the American Bar Association, and that the cases it takes "do not necessarily reflect the views of the university or its law school."

"Like law schools across the country, our legal clinic provides valuable learning experience for students and accepts cases ranging across the political and legal spectrum" from pro-Palestinian demonstrators to Jan. 6 protesters, the spokesperson said Tuesday. The spokesperson also referenced the law school’s recent partnership with the Brandeis Center to handle antisemitism cases in elementary and high schools.

The U.S. Department of Education's Federal Student Aid office fined Liberty University, in Virginia, a record $14 million for violating a federal campus safety law, the agency announced in March 2024. 

The fine was the largest ever imposed over violations of the 34-year-old Clery Act, which mandates that federally funded colleges provide notices about public safety issues and support victims of violence. 

The Education Department said the evangelical institution had failed to provide accurate disclosures, comply with requirements to prevent sexual violence, issue timely warnings about criminal activities and send emergency notifications to the campus community about potentially dangerous situations. 

The Education Department launched the investigation in February 2022 after receiving “several complaints” alleging Clery violations, the agency said on March 5. The investigation also came after ProPublica published accounts in 2021 from college women who said their reports of sexual assault were dismissed and discouraged by Liberty officials. 

With this fine, the Education Department is sending a message that it will hold colleges accountable if they don’t comply with the Clery Act, said Richard Cordray, Federal Student Aid’s chief operating officer. 

“Schools are obligated to take action that creates safe and secure campus communities, investigate complaints, and responsibly disclose information about crimes and other safety concerns,” Cordray said in a statement Tuesday. “We will continue to hold schools accountable if they fail to do so.”

In October, the university told Fox News that the Education Department was considering fining it $37.5 million over Clery violations. 

When asked why the fine imposed was lower than this amount, a Federal Student Aid senior department official said “what was proposed” or said earlier was not relevant. The fine resulted from an extensive review, said the official, who spoke on background during a Q&A phone call with reporters. 

“We’re imposing a $14 million fine,” the official said. “It is more than triple the largest fine ever imposed for violations of the Clery Act, and we think it sends a strong message today that these are serious matters that schools need to handle appropriately.”

The second-largest Clery fine was issued against Michigan State University in 2019. The Education Department fined the university $4.5 million following an investigation into how it handled reports against Larry Nassar, a former university doctor who sexually abused college athletes under the guise of medical treatment. 

In Liberty’s case, the university has also agreed to spend an additional $2 million over the next two years to improve campus safety. 

In a lengthy public statement, the university said it has invested $10 million since 2022 to improve campus infrastructure, security assets and surveillance equipment. It has also taken steps like hiring new personnel who are experts in areas like law enforcement and Title IX, the federal law requiring colleges to respond to and discipline sexual violence, the university said. 

Liberty agreed that “numerous deficiencies” existed in the past, including “incorrect statistical reports” and failing to send timely emergency notifications. 

“We acknowledge and regret these past failures and have taken these necessary improvements seriously,” it said.

However, Liberty also argued that it hasn’t been treated the same way as other universities.

“Many of the Department’s methodologies, findings, and calculations in the report were drastically different from their historic treatment of other universities,” it said. “Liberty disagrees with this unfair treatment.”

Education Department officials, however, said Liberty’s violations were extensive. 

The agency's investigation found Liberty didn’t comply with multiple Clery requirements pertaining to sexual violence, such as notifying victims of their rights. The institution also failed to compile and publish accurate crime statistics from 2016 to 2021. 

The Education Department will monitor Liberty through April 2026 to ensure the college follows through on its pledged improvements. Further Clery violations could jeopardize the terms of the university’s access to federal financial aid or result in further sanctions, the agency said.

Kristen Shahverdian is a senior manager for free expression and education at PEN America. Sam LaFrance is the manager of editorial projects for free expression and education at PEN America. PEN America is a nonprofit devoted to protecting free expression. 

Campuses have long been hotbeds of debate, protest and political tensions, but few issues have been as vehemently contested in recent years as conflicts related to Israel and Palestine. 

It is no surprise, then, that as the Israel-Hamas conflict has escalated since early October, U.S. campuses have spiraled into a crisis, as holding space for any reasonable disagreement has seemed nearly impossible.

In recent days, campuses across the country have been host to protests with extreme rhetoric. College students say they have been assaulted, faced their personal information being leaked online, lost job offers over statements about the conflict, and expressed fear about antisemitic and Islamophobic harassment. 

Republican presidential candidates and commentators have even proposed revoking visas of international students whose public comments are deemed in support of Hamas. Never has the potential blowback for speaking freely on political issues seemed so high concerning both students’ personal safety and their future careers. 

Colleges and universities are special. They are one of the few places left in our society that are meant to foster an environment where open discourse and disagreement can occur across the ideological spectrum. But the events in Israel and in Gaza are testing higher education’s ability to live up to that mission. 

School administrators have an obligation to embrace free expression while protecting the rights and safety of all. By upholding free speech, clearly delineating between speech and violence, and promoting physical safety, campus leaders can ensure that freedom of expression and the opportunity for open exchange does not become an afterthought.

Campus leaders should start by acknowledging that words have power. They should name risks to open discourse and seek — through dialogue, facilitation and information-sharing — to help make students more aware of how their words may land with others. And they must do so while vigorously defending their students’ right to free speech. 

They can remind the campus and the public that students have been on the forefront of dissent, protest and social movements throughout history, and that the passionate exchange of ideas is in fact one of the ideals of higher education. This exchange exposes students to ideas and perspectives that may make them uncomfortable or angry, and universities should use such heated moments as teachable ones.

Administrators should also clearly lay out their policies on hate speech and harassment, explaining that even hateful or racist speech is protected by the First Amendment, but also articulating when that speech crosses a line. 

On public university campuses, this means that leaders may condemn hurtful rhetoric, but unless it crosses into harassment or threats, students should not be punished for their speech. On private campuses, administrators should hold themselves to a similarly high bar. 

Hate should be taken seriously. As bias reports rise for Jewish, Arab and Muslim students, administrators must be steadfast in their support for students — without resorting to censorship.

Throughout this tumultuous period, consistently and often, university leaders can model respectful discourse and expressions of empathy. They should make clear to students how they intend to support them by sharing information on mental health services, dispelling misinformation circling their campus, reaching out directly to students who are personally affected by the war, and contacting and offering support to those who are targeted by speech or for their own expression.

At the same time, it is of the utmost importance that campus leaders ensure the physical security of campus spaces, and that they allow students from across the ideological spectrum to gather, protest, mourn, speak and learn from one another. 

Reports of physical attacks on students, as we have seen at Columbia, Stanford and elsewhere, as well as hateful vandalism, as we have seen across the country, should never be conflated with protected political speech. 

If violence does occur, administrators should communicate clearly that this is unacceptable and illegal. When speech crosses into criminal behavior, including true threats or hate crimes, punitive or criminal measures should be pursued, but administrators should also consider restorative and educational approaches whenever possible.

Cultivating campus safety also means speaking out clearly against online attacks and exposure of students’ personal information. At several universities in recent weeks, an outside group has driven trucks around campuses with a billboard labeling some students “antisemites.” In some cases, they shared website links with their personal information.

This prompted administrators at Harvard to announce that they would close campus to non-ID holders after dark and issue a statement providing updates on security measures on campus. 

This kind of targeted doxxing can be an invitation to violence, and it can chill protected political speech. In addition to ensuring physical campus safety, administrators can proactively provide anti-doxxing resources to students and faculty and provide mental health support to those who have been targeted by online abuse.

This is an important moment for a university to lean into these challenges around open discourse and exchange, not shy away from them. Our higher education institutions should be making space for carefully facilitated town halls, teach-ins, and dialogues open to all. Universities should also take advantage of their communities of experts, who can help inform students and the broader public about the conflict’s complexity and history.

Ultimately, universities have a responsibility to support all students' free expression, even when that expression is uncomfortable or painful. They must rise to the challenge.

Since a mass shooting at Michigan State University killed three students and injured five others earlier in 2023, the university has been working to protect students, faculty and staff from ever enduring another attack. 

In the weeks after the Feb. 13 shooting, the university held a series of campus safety town halls with members of the community about improvements they wanted to see, said Dana Whyte, a spokesperson for the Michigan State Department of Police and Public Safety. 

Following those sessions, the university’s president, chief of police and vice president of public safety announced four campus safety changes in early March, Whyte said. They included beefing up security and offering active violence incident training to all students, she said. 

“We want to make sure that we're covering all areas and giving our community as many resources as possible,” said Whyte.

Michigan State is one of many colleges trying to secure their campuses and train students to respond to active shooter incidents in the hopes of preventing a mass shooting. As of April 25, there had been at least 173 mass shootings in the U.S. this year, according to the Gun Violence Archive. The archive defines mass shootings as incidents in which at least four victims were shot.

But there is no higher ed policy or strategy that can eliminate the possibility of a mass shooting, said Pedro Noguera, dean of the University of Southern California’s School of Education. And a lack of action by federal policymakers on gun control has left college leaders to develop strategies on their own, he said. 

A number of colleges have responded to the nation's mass shooting epidemic by making their campuses much less accessible to the public, said Noguera, “which is unfortunate, because universities are public resources.” 

School mass shooting experts say colleges could train campus communities to identify potential threats and better respond to mass violence events. However, such measures will still not guarantee anyone’s safety, Noguera said. 

“It's sad to say that everybody's left on their own to figure this out, because our policymakers have totally failed us,” said Noguera. “Truthfully, there’s not a lot we can do.”

The shooter could be a student, employee or, like at Michigan State, it could be someone outside the campus community, he said. And, ultimately, “there are simply too many dangerous people with guns.”

Boosting security, warning students

Over the past 20 years, many colleges and universities have gotten more sophisticated with reconnaissance, response and communication protocols, according to Ron Avi Astor, social welfare professor at the University of California, Los Angeles. Astor, who studies school violence, also said colleges are working with law enforcement more efficiently

Michigan State’s new safety measures are one example of change implemented by universities in recent years. 

Students, faculty and staff now need to use their school ID card to enter buildings between 6 pm and 7:30 am on weekdays and at all hours on weekends, said Whyte. Previously, all academic buildings were open while classes were in session.

The university has also begun outfitting 1,300 classrooms with a new lock system, allowing instructors to secure their doors while still providing access to law enforcement and first responders. And the university plans to add to the more than 2,000 security cameras on campus to capture areas where “there could be a potential room for improvement,” Whyte said. 

At the University of Virginia — where three school football players were killed and two others wounded by a gunman on a university charter bus in November returning to campus — security is also being heightened. 

The university is adding public safety resources and adjusting how it manages threat-assessment processes and administers no-trespass orders, according to a March website post. 

University officials plan to meet regularly with state and local officials to review crime data and weigh other initiatives that promote “a safe, healthy living and learning environment, including community access to mental health and youth engagement resources,” the post stated. 

Many colleges have also implemented active shooter alert systems for their campus communities. 

Students and staff at West Valley College, in Saratoga, California, received such an alert in March while police searched for a man who was reportedly carrying a long rifle. The message advised students and staff to run off campus, hide if they didn't know where the threat was or how many suspects there were, and fight if the intruder entered their hiding spot. 

Michigan State is trying to boost its capabilities on that front as well, with a new 24-7 security operation center where staff will answer phones, issue alerts and monitor cameras.

Astor pointed out, however, that while surveillance and security are important, a heavy police presence and security measures can sometimes make students feel less safe. College leaders should balance police and safety with ensuring students continue to feel comfortable on campus and not as though they are under constant threat, he said. 

Training and support

In addition to enhancing security, universities can help train students to respond to a mass shooter incident. 

During the upcoming fall semester, Michigan State will strongly encourage all students, faculty and staff to take active violence incident training, which it currently offers upon request. The university is developing what the new training will look like, said Whyte.

“We don't want to retraumatize our community after the events that we just went through,” Whyte said. “So we’re giving everyone the option to have this training and take it when they're ready.”

Universities could train students as co-responders capable of providing first aid or crisis assistance, expanding a university’s response capacity, Astor said. 

That includes talking down a potential shooter, helping someone who’s been shot, helping people evacuate a building, or knowing where to go if someone is making threats, he said. It can also include helping peers and colleagues dealing with post-traumatic stress disorder or mental health issues following a shooting. 

“People have more of a sense of efficacy in the response, and not feeling that everything is dependent on law enforcement or everything is depending on their administration,” Astor said. 

Noguera said colleges can also help employees identify students or staff who issue threats or may be at-risk of perpetuating violence. 

“We've got to get better at identifying those individuals, so we get them help before it becomes an issue of violence that we have to contend with,” he said. 

Often, people who commit acts of violence had made previous threats and were armed and dangerous — and others knew about it, said Noguera. 

Still, it’s important for colleges to try and clarify what a potential mass shooter looks like, Astor said. 

Many people are dealing with a range of mental health issues and there are hundreds of millions of guns in the U.S. But people with mental health issues are in fact more likely to be the victims of violence than the perpetrators, studies have found. And few people who have access to firearms become mass shooters, Astor said.

A mass shooter is someone who has no regard for the lives of others or their own life, according to Astor. Mass shootings themselves are forms of terrorism, meant to hurt and kill as many people as possible, he said. They're not perpetrated just because someone gained access to an AR-15.

Mass shooters often try to get media coverage. They put out manifestos, tell people about their mass shooting plans on websites, study prior mass shootings, and try to inflict more harm than previous shooters did, said Astor. The shooters have an obsession — perhaps a compulsion — with firearms, he said. 

“That's not the same as depression. That’s not the same as somebody buying a gun,” Astor said.

Gary S. May is the chancellor of the University of California, Davis.

Editor's note: The following op-ed was written prior to March 2023 protests against a student-organized far-right speaker event on the UC Davis campus.

In today’s highly charged and politicized environment, free speech has become both a weapon and a shield. Increasingly heated and divisive debates about free speech and hate speech are playing out at college campuses across the country. But at universities, free speech remains at the heart of our mission — even when we may profoundly disagree with its content. 

At the University of California, Davis, we’ve seen recent hate speech targeting Black Americans, Jewish people, Muslims, Asian Americans and the LGBTQIA+ community. We’ve seen outside groups with their own agendas come to campus with the intention to disrupt and cause damage. We’ve heard calls from students, faculty and staff who want to ban those who express ideologies with which they disagree

The desire to ban the expression of these ideologies stems from behavior that goes further than speech. The FBI reported last year that hate crimes are on the rise nationally. And the Anti-Defamation League reported antisemitic behavior had increased 34% year over year, with 2,717 incidents nationwide in 2021. That’s the highest number seen in nearly half a century.

Yet, we cannot close off our campuses to people and views we disagree with. We cannot isolate ourselves from bullies or from words that are hurtful, mean-spirited or offensive. Freedom of expression is vital to the higher education mission. 

College campuses have played a historic role in freedom of expression and students have been central to debating and protesting some of our nation’s most hotly contested issues. Consider the Vietnam War, the civil rights movement and Occupy Wall Street.

There are many good reasons the right to free speech is enshrined in the First Amendment. Free speech allows people from marginalized communities to have a voice. That was certainly true during the civil rights movement, which fought to eliminate segregation and provide greater equality for African Americans like me. Its hard-won gains largely relied on the right to freedom of expression and the freedom to assemble and peaceably protest — without property damage or violence.

On the other hand, those same free speech protections also extend to those with abhorrent views who choose to spread hate.

Let me be clear: I do not condone hate speech or violence. Hate speech and hate incidents are distressing for everyone in a campus community, especially for people who are personally targeted by antisemitic, racist or other hateful words and behaviors. 

At public universities, upholding free speech protections is not just the right thing to do. It’s required by law. That’s why, at UC Davis, student organizations bring speakers with diverse — and sometimes controversial — perspectives to campus. It’s why our campus provides an open forum for many views, ideas and opinions, including those that some may dislike or find offensive. 

Here are three things I’ve learned about navigating the complexities of free speech in today’s fraught climate. 

First, we’re never going to please everyone, but we can make decisions consistent with our higher education mission. There’s an intrinsic connection between fostering a teaching and learning environment and allowing freedom of expression. As institutions of higher learning, we create spaces where students are introduced to and can debate many different ideas and viewpoints. Through this process, students develop critical thinking skills to identify disinformation and discern which ideas will contribute to the advancement of truth. This is a powerful way to disarm the influence of hate speech.

Second, we must make comprehensive plans that allow speech while protecting the campus community from those who want to do harm. We’ve seen incidents on campuses across the country, where free-speech-related protests devolved into violence. That includes Penn State canceling an October speech on campus with Proud Boys founder Gavin McInnes following confrontations between protestors and chemical irritants being sprayed into the crowd. In 2017, Molotov cocktails were launched at police during a protest against a scheduled appearance by Milo Yiannopoulos at UC Berkeley.

For that reason, while allowing freedom of expression, we must plan and act to minimize the potential for harm to our campus communities. At UC Davis, if we anticipate any protests to events on campus, our planning process often begins months in advance and involves multiple stakeholders, including students and other campus leaders, as well as our city of Davis colleagues. We make a point to reach out to community members beforehand to ensure that lines of communication remain open. 

Third, we must look beyond our campus borders. The same negative influences on our campuses are also felt deeply in our surrounding communities and in society. I believe the best way forward is not to silence those voices we dislike, but rather to rebut them and counter them with something better.

At UC Davis, we’re partnering with the city of Davis and Yolo County to create a new initiative called Hate-Free Together. We’re asking our communities to take action against the rise of hate incidents we’ve seen locally by joining together to condemn hate and cultivate change.

It’s based on Healthy Davis Together, a comprehensive COVID-19 response program developed to keep our broader community healthy, reduce test positivity rates, prevent illness and save lives during the pandemic. But in this case hate, rather than COVID, is the virus we are trying to eradicate.

To eradicate hate, we must first identify it, and then counter with the strength of our educational communities — something that universities are uniquely suited to accomplish. In the words of the late Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.: “Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.”