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Students afraid to walk alone around campus no longer have to worry when their friends aren’t around.
The Community Service Corps, a group of work study students employed by campus security, provides an escort program for students and faculty needing to walk to their dorms or vehicles in the dark. The program is designed to keep people safe and to provide comfort to anyone who has to walk alone.
“Our goal is to keep people safe, and help keep the campus safer,” said Cathrine Smith, a second-year art education and anthropology student and member of the Community Service Corps. “It’s a service [campus security] decided would be great just to help people feel comfortable.”
Those who would like an escort can call 581-WALK and, until midnight, students from the Community Service Corps will walk with them to their destination. After midnight, campus security guards or members of public safety are available to walk with anyone who needs an escort. Escorts can drive people to their destination if traveling across campus or in inclement weather, but try to walk when possible.
“The idea is safety, not convenience,” said Jim Dalton, security supervisor and creator of the Community Service Corps.
Dalton and the members of the Community Service Corps want to assist students and faculty, but have to maintain the rest of the program. Members of the Community Service Corps are essential to the security program at the university, but the escort program is only a small part of their overall purpose.
“We patrol buildings, campus, check call boxes to make sure that they’re functional … and pretty much augment and aid the security force,” Smith said. “I think it’s a really great program.”
Members of the program must undergo a basic security officer course and become familiar with the campus.
“You learn campus so much better,” said Brittany Pierce, a fourth-year mechanical engineering student and Community Service Corps project manager.
Dalton said the members of the program are critical because of limited security staff.
“My officers know what the value of these students is,” Dalton said. “We do [our job] and we do it fairly well, but we also have the luxury of being able to augment with the Community Service Corps students to assist us on patrol. But they have other things to do other than just escort duties.”
The Community Service Corps hopes the escort service gains more exposure so that people feel comfortable asking for an escort. So far this semester, few people have used the service.
“We’ve had a couple people,” Pierce said. “A lot of people will repeat once they figure out that they can use it. It’s not very well advertised.”
“I think for the most part, this campus is pretty safe,” Smith said. “I know a lot of people fear walking alone. Some of my friends walk alone at night … I was talking to them about the program and they said that they wished they knew about it.”
Bangor Daily News