Yesterday, the Columbia Community received an email from James McShane announcing the release of Public Safety’s Annual Report. Bwog’s Crime Bureau Chief Jon Hill crunched some numbers and compared Columbia with Duke and U. Chicago (our peers in U.S. News rankings) on their levels of per-student (full-time enrollee) crime.

Says Hill: “The University of Chicago comes off looking like Munchkinland. Their crime reports are full of zeroes, with the total number of incidents reported bottoming out at about 20 percent of Columbia and Duke. Considering U. Chicago’s main campus is on the city’s infamous South Side, though, I have a feeling that these numbers do not accurately reflect the level of campus crime.

Duke and Columbia are about on par when it comes to crime. Duke has far more alcohol/drug/weapons-related incidents, but this is not unusual given Duke’s suburban campus (security officers more likely to notice students drinking, fewer off-campus bars, etc.). Schools may also vary in their level of enforcement for these types of incidents. As for non-vice crimes, Columbia has more incidents reported but a lower count per student.

Also, the numbers from James McShane do suggest a “War on Fun” — drug and alcohol incidents are up 325 percent over last year.”

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Tomorrow, US News & World Report will release the most important list of our time or any other: its annual ranking of the best colleges and universities.

Bwog received an exciting advance press release, the only information on which was that this year Columbia, Duke, and the University of Chicago share the 8th place spot for top universities. (UChicago and Columbia were tied for the #9 spot last year, while Duke ranked 8th.)

We look forward to seeing the rest of the list in all its schadenfreude-y glory tomorrow, and will update with the rest of the rankings as soon as we receive them.

UPDATE 11:51 AM: Full list — well, full list of the portion you’re interested in — after the jump. (Or check comment #1, because this comment foretold the future quite accurately.)

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Chinese pride (at right)

This afternoon at 1:00 PM. Lou Dobbs, eat your heart out.

Discoveries of New Burial Plots

For a mere $25,000, you can get buried at Duke. But hurry–already 200 reservations have been made. According to the Chronicle, “the one-and-a-half acre area first opened in response to requests from alumni in the past few decades who wanted to have a final resting place at the University.” Pity, Columnia alumi will have to make do with Manhattanville…

Self-Promotion, Health Promotion

As part of their health promotion program, Go Ask Alice! (the friendly Q&A health website that brought you answers about sexy role plays and tattoo guides) is sponsoring a photo contest only a month away. All Columbia students are eligible to send in photos that will be published on the Ask Alice webpage. And that’s right kids, you’ll get your own photo credit! Deadline: February 23rd.

SIPA, Student Soldiers, and Kitsch

The Morningside Post (Delivering SIPA’s Global and Local Enterprise in their very own blog) brings another point of view to the student-soldier debate with a video produced by SIPA students Caroline Bray and Aaron Ernst. Highlights include varied interviews and kitschy classical (juxtaposed to hard rock macho) music. Just another example of Columbia students’ talent with video equipment!

Raising The Bar

Abe Handler overheard this in the business school library today afternoon: “I feel like everybody and their dog has 100 million dollars. The question is how to go from like here (gestures to his waist) to like here (gestures to his shoulders).”

- YS

Two female first-years were overheard bringing new meaning to “innocent until proven guilty” near the John Jay elevators:

Girl 1: “My dad works with one of the Duke lacrosse players who got in trouble.”

Girl 2: “Really? Which one?”

Girl 1: “The really hot one.”