How State Funding Made Campuses Safer

One of the concerns many students have before choosing a college to attend is campus safety, and in recent years, Ohio legislators have set aside significant funding to help make upgrades to give students and their families peace of mind.  

In 2021, legislators designated $5 million for the Campus Safety Grant Program. The initiative provided funding to help Ohio public colleges and universities  make needed upgrades. The minimum grant offered that year was $50,000 and the highest given was $387,000. In 2022, another $5 million for the Campus Safety Grant Program was included as part of the state’s capital budget.

“Because of the success in how many applied the first year, the General Assembly decided to fund it again,” says Emily Torok, Executive Director of the Ohio School Safety Center. The state organization helps schools and first responders prevent, prepare for and respond to threats and violence. In accordance with the Campus Safety Grant Program, the Ohio School Safety Center worked with the Ohio Department of Higher Education and then-Chancellor Randy Gardner to administer the funding. 

State legislators did not fund the Campus Safety Grant Program for a third year in 2023, but the program has already made a difference in helping colleges across the state bring about improvements that enhance campus safety. 

Torok says that the grants approved in 2021 and 2022 helped ensure the physical safety of students with upgrades ranging from lighting in parking lots to door locks to video cameras. She adds that the Campus Safety Grant Program grantees were required to conduct a security and vulnerability assessment. 

“That’s a physical assessment to see what they need,” Torok says. “With local law enforcement or campus security, [colleges] conduct a security and vulnerability assessment and then apply for those elements that may be lacking.” 

The institution is also required to give examples of crimes that have occurred on or near the campus. 

“This is not necessarily personal crime, but often property crime like vehicle theft or break-ins in a particular parking lot,” Torok says. 

Southern State Community College, which has a central campus in Hillsboro, was one of the recipients of the 2022 round of Campus Safety Grant Program funding. The college received just over $190,000, according to Brian Rice, Southern State Community College’s Vice President for Technology & Infrastructure. From that funding, $142,000 is being used at the Highland County campus to upgrade entrance- and exit-door security throughout the main building. The remainder of the funding will address other campus needs. 

“Through the College Safety Grant, the college [gained] crucial resources to implement security-related projects that might otherwise exceed our typical capabilities,” says Mindy Markey-Grabill, Vice President of Human Resources at Southern State Community College. 

Torok says many grant requests were fueled by the reality that colleges and universities have a large area and a large population to protect.  

“A lot of our college campuses now have health clinics and mental health centers that are open 24 hours, and often they’re inviting the public into these spaces,” she explains. “They’re wanting more physical upgrades because there are more people on campus.  … [They want to] make sure that the people who are coming onto campus are there for the reasons they are supposed to be.” 

The number of applicants for the grant was up significantly in the program’s second year, Torok says, showing that Ohio’s colleges and universities are committed to campus safety. Nearly every application that met the program’s standards received funding too.   

“We tried to award most if not all the grant requests, unless they missed a step in the process, and then we tried to contact them if they missed a step,” she says “[For] anyone who applies, the Chancellor wants to give at least some funding.”

Ohio’s Campus Safety Grant Program was an important source for the state’s public colleges and universities, as there are not many federal grants supporting safety for institutions of higher learning, according to Torok. 

She says the fact that grant requests rose between years one and two is a good metric of need, and the Ohio School Safety Center stands ready to oversee and administer the grant program if it is funded again in the future. 

“As long as our General Assembly decides to fund this program … we’ll continue with these grants,” Torok says. “I have told our colleges and universities that if this is something they’re interested in, they should speak with their legislators.”

This story ran in the Winter-Spring 2024 issue of College 101.