Napoleon Bonaparte stated that “The infectiousness of crime is like that of the plague”. If anyone hasn’t noticed, Temple is located in the heart of North Philadelphia, where crime runs rampant daily. I can only imagine the concern of the president of the university when the Clery Act was introduced.
This mandate, while being a most helpful law, also put extreme pressure on colleges and universities to inn act and put in place a system to make all students, parents and faculty aware of any crime in or around a certain vicinity of the university.
It seems to me that the cost of this law to be realized and effective on university campuses should not be as big a concern as loosing the universities financial aid as a result of not following the Clery Act law. Temple seems to have the way in which it distributes the notice of crime all figured out. Temple shots out a mass e-mail to all individuals important to the university, thus reducing costs for the university.
Looking at another university that this law may affect unsympathetically is Penn State University. As per a news article posted on July 23rd, 2012, by the National Council of Women’s Organization (http://www.womensorganizations.org/?p=232&option=com_wordpress&Itemid=114), Penn State is in jeopardy of losing its financial aid if found guilty of violating the clery Act by covering up the allegations of sexual harassment. Penn State has already been hit with fines in access of $60 million. If the Department of Education revokes financial aid from Penn State, who knows what’s on the horizon for the