A study by Your Local Security, a company backed by ADT, released a study on the safest schools in the country and states.
Three colleges in East Texas made the top 10 in safest schools in the state.
The study uses the following criteria to determine their list:
“We tallied campus hate crime and violence against women (VAWA) rates per the U.S. Department of Education’s Campus Safety and Security report. We also tallied violent and property crime rates in each college’s hometown per the FBI Uniform Crime Report, to give relevant context about the city where students may live and work while attending school.”
Forty-one colleges were included in the survey, with a two or four-year degree program and a student population of 5,000 or greater.
On the Texas list, Stephen F. Austin comes in at number three, Texas A&M Commerce as fifth and the University of Texas at Tyler at 10th.
The schools were ranked based on a weighted system.
Hate crimes and violence against college women were 80%, violent crimes in the college’s city made up 15%, and property crime in the city was 5%.
All three East Texas schools all have their own university police departments, as well as additional security measures, including blue light emergency phones.
UT Tyler, in addition to its 12 police officers, has on-campus security guards.
"They travel by foot. They travel by golf cart on occasion and then also by police cars," UT Tyler president Michael Tidwell said.
Stephen F. Austin has 27 officers as well as parking officers and emergency management personnel.
“We also have additional security personnel, outside of university personnel, in place during high traffic events, such as home football games,” Shirley Luna, SFA executive director of marketing communications, said.
Below is a full list of all the colleges in Texas used in the study:
- The University of Texas at Arlington
- Lee College
- West Texas A&M University
- Texas A&M University-Commerce
- Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi
- Navarro College
- Southern Methodist University
- Richland College
- Dallas Baptist University
- University of North Texas
- Texas Woman's University
- The University of Texas at El Paso
- Texas Christian University
- Rice University
- University of Houston-Downtown
- Texas Southern University
- Sam Houston State University
- Central Texas College
- Texas A&M International University
- South Plains College
- Eastfield College
- Midland College
- Stephen F Austin State University
- Odessa College
- Prairie View A&M University
- The University of Texas at Dallas
- Angelo State University
- Texas A&M University-San Antonio
- Palo Alto College
- St. Philip's College
- Northwest Vista College
- San Antonio College
- The University of Texas at San Antonio
- University of the Incarnate Word
- Texas State University
- Tarleton State University
- The University of Texas at Tyler
- McLennan Community College
- Baylor University
- Wharton County Junior College
- Midwestern State University