Award Recipients For 2003

The "Jeanne Clery Campus Safety Award" was established in 1994 by Howard & Connie Clery to honor schools and individuals that have done extraordinary things to make college and university students safer.

UPenn: Judith Rodin, President, Maureen Rush, V.P. of Public Safety

It is with great pleasure that we announce this year’s recipients of the Jeanne Clery Campus Safety Award. Two of the recipients, the University of Pennsylvania and the University of Bridgeport, are receiving the award because of their effective use of cutting-edge technologies, which are now available to greatly improve campus safety. Such technologies - sophisticated surveillance systems in the case of UPenn and a monitored personal alarm device network at UBridgeport - are becoming more and more affordable.

UBridgeport: April Vournelis, Dir. of Campus Security and Neil Salonen, Pres.

The positive results of utilizing such technologies are becoming clear thanks to pioneers such as this year’s award winners. The University of Pennsylvania achieved decreases in overall crime of more than 30%! This is significant and should be of interest to other urban campuses with similar concerns.

“We wanted to honor the University of Pennsylvania for its innovative technological programs as well as its campus and community patrols,” Howard Clery III said. “This award also lets the rest of the academic world know that schools are fighting campus crime with programs that do work.”

Kate Dieringer

At the University of Bridgeport (CT), a Personal Alarm Device system was installed seven years ago as a solution to the problem of criminals preying upon students on the urban campus. April Vournelis, Director of Campus Security, provides every student and employee with a personal alarm device that, when activated, calls the campus security department indicating their exact location. As a result campus security officers’ response time is usually under two minutes. Crime has decreased dramatically since the system was installed according to Vournelis.

We are also honoring Kate Dieringer, a student at Georgetown University in Washington D.C. for her work to bring about improvements in how her school handles complaints of sexual assault and other violence. Dieringer, the survivor of a campus sexual assault the fall of her freshman year, went public with her story last year. She rallied students on campus to demand stronger policies against campus rape and the disclosure of more information about students found responsible for violent acts. She challenged Georgetown’s incorrect interpretation of FERPA (Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act), which they were using as an excuse to keep important information about the results of campus judicial proceedings from being disclosed.

Our congratulations and thanks to this year’s recipients of the Jeanne Clery Campus Safety Award!

Connie and Howard Clery