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Following the Virginia Tech shootings, Public Safety has announced that all Student Aides, who help man dorm security desks, are to be replaced with regular security guards for the rest of the semester. In an email sent today by Student Aide Coordinator Andrew Ness (provided after the jump), students who work at the desks were told to pick up their paychecks and not to report for duty again.
Some who wrote to Bwog questioned the move, especially because students were invited to apply again for the same positions when Fall semester came around. “They did not provide a correlation between the shootings and exactly why we should lose our jobs,” said one of the students affected. “It’s only bad if we’re randomly killed now, but not in September?”
Bwog posed this question to Mr. Ness, who wrote that he was not at liberty to discuss Public Safety’s plans in further detail. He simply confirmed that, following “the events at Virginia Tech[,] the University is reexamining its security policies to ensure the continued safety of the University community and to maintain our position as the safest Ivy League School.”
UPDATE, Wednesday, 11:12 AM: Assistant VP for Strategic Communications and Planning Rosemary Keane assures us that no students will lose their jobs–all will be reassigned to jobs in Housing and Dining.
– CJS
Dear Student Aides,
I have some unfortunate news to pass along to all of you. In the wake of
the Virginia Tech shootings, University Officials have decided that
effective immediately, student aides will *NOT* be working in the
dormitories for the remainder of the year, including reading week and
finals period. I repeat, your work commitment to Public Safety for this
semester ends today (4/17). From this point on the dormitories will be
filled with Public Safety Security Officers. My apologies for the late
notice and I regret any trouble this may cause you.
You have a paycheck available this Friday April 20, and hours from
yesterday and today will be reflected on the paycheck available Friday
May 4.
Thank you all for your diligence and hard work this semester. You’re [sic]
work greatly benefits the University. I would encourage all of you to
reapply this upcoming fall. Thanks again, and if you have any questions,
don’t hesitate to email me.
Sincerely,
Andrew Ness
Student Aide Coordinator
Public Safety, Columbia University
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30 Comments
@Matthew Harrison The affected students will be reassigned to positions within Housing and Dining. No one will be made “unemployed” by this.
@... i expect an editorial in the spec tomorrow demanding that the university at least pay these kids that depend on this money. it’s really not their fault.
@they're right look at the graphic. the student aide is clearly not even swiping the magstripe part of the card through the reader! That aide was a huge security hole in the otherwise fortress-like defense that is Columbia! Good riddance
@Enrollment Deposit The deadline for enrollment deposits has not yet passed. We’re in Days on Campus season. This is about numbers and stats. We had a banner year in terms of selectivity, but if we don’t follow up with a non-terrible yield, our precious USNWR ranking will drop. With this gesture, the University is trying to assuage the concerns of the class of ’11 parents.
The University won’t spend more money than it has to, though, so look for that cheap and plentiful student labor to once again replace the expensive, overtime-earning, unionized security guards come late August, when the tuition checks are safely in the bank.
@totally true I think this is right. Now let’s be nice to the prefroshes at the end of this week.
@Sigh... This is ridiculous. It’s exactly the sort of paranoid move which is going to scare people more and make us all miserable on campus. The chances of a copycat incident are extremely slim. Heck, the chances of a University campus being shot up in the first place are ridiculously slim in the first place – part of the reason we’re all so shocked. The VT shootings are a sobering wakeup call, not something which will inspire depressed college kids across the country to kill more people. This is just for show, and it promotes paranoia at Columbia which is just about the worst thing we can do at the moment.
@alma You make way too many assumptions. I’m sorry, but the chances still exist.
And unless you’re some sort of medical expert, I don’t think you can say it won’t inspire depressed kids. Actually, I wouldn’t buy that even if you were.
It’s people like you who don’t think bad things will happen to them so they don’t report anything suspicious, or don’t care enough to contact someone when a person has been clearly depressed and solitary for years.
You know most people who commit suicide usually tell someone before or at least suggest it?
I’m sorry, I’m angry. I’m from Virginia.
@Some guards are mad cool. I’ve seen them watching “Old School” and other movies with excessive violence and/or lotsa sexytime. Lotsa sexytime, ain’t that what it’s all about kids?
@come on it seems pretty obvious that this is a knee-jerk response that doesn’t have much to do with rational considerations. security guards are probably better than student aides at making you sign in your friends, but both would be pretty inadequate protections against a gunman on a killing spree.
it’s not like this particular shooting has revealed a previously-hidden flaw in security. it just makes people nervous and afraid. posting more security guards is supposed to make people less nervous and afraid.
@ehh one would hope a university would care at least a bit about “rational considerations”. we’ll leave knee-jerk responses to nervous, trigger-happy presidents.
@0.02 dollars I believe it’s supposed to be a more symbolic picture. It’s a bad swipe. It makes a bad sound when it happens. Nobody likes it.
To me, this whole situation is just a classic example of fear politics. Use a legitimate concern to justify a not-so-legit decision, then hope that because everyone’s a little afraid, nobody will say anything against it.
I’m sorry for the aids:
1)they weren’t given even a one day’s notice.
2)they weren’t given any options on how to finish off the semester
3)some of them would have made as much as $450 dollars from now until they leave for summer, and on a tight budget, that’s a lot.
Also, what is our campus wide emergency plan?
1: how do they notify every student immediately that something has to happen?
2: where do you evacuate if need be?
3: how do you do so such that you don’t get the entire campus in one open field and hence defeat the point of the evacuation?
@wien? I wonder if this was prompted by the wien incident as well? does anyone with details about that want to come forward to bwog?
@HA! HA! guy Right…because security guard’s are expendable, right?
A billy club or nightstick is certainly going to be more effective against some nutcase with a .22 or 9 mm handgun.
@DUDE I really hope the university decides to pay the students even if they can’t re-assign them new jobs. Some of those students need the work-study money.
@pfff a) be nice to the guards, you’ll be better for it.
b) no, the security guards do NOT carry tasers.
@man would you pay attention if you were working security on an eight hour shift with no breaks when there were never any security threats?
@.... ITS THEIR EFFING JOB!
if they dont like it, they can go find another one.
@yes thats easy. particularly when, like most of the Columbia guards, you’re a person of color from upper Manhattan or the Bronx. the unemployment rate is so low…
VA Tech shooting or not, i could do with less security at this school. it’d be nice to be able to exit the campus somewhere north of 116th street on weekends. i’ll accept whatever miniscule increase in the risk of a shooting, which is orders of magnitude less than the risk of dying in a car accident, in exchange for the freedom of movement.
@did you miss the brutal rape of the j-school student? guns aren’t the only threat on campus.
@yellow the j-school incident wasn’t on campus
@volut whatever. having a security guard at the desk makes the building only marginally safer. scares away the creeps, which deserves a mention, but it’s really just something to tell parents on campus tours.
i don’t blame them if their hearts aren’t in it. it’s monotonous as hell, and on weekends they eke out their living by watching drunk laughing rich kids run around enjoying themselves.
@that's probably what the guards were saying to each other at va. tech yesterday morning.
@the guards are as good as NOT THERE. they sleep, or at any rate they don’t pay attention. let’s not forget that famous quote, cited here i think, from a guard who said that if he sees something, he just looks away: ‘that’s just one more thing i have to write in my book,’ he said. i believe it. the guards also don’t know how to alphabetize, given how they misfile guest’s id cards all the time. so aside from replacing students with men, they should make sure those men are not dolts.
@good move Hopefully Columbia will place these students in other jobs. A lot of them do this for work-study. In any case, I prefer a real security guard to a student doing homework. And that’s some picture, bwog.
@alma does anyone know how many students are aides? i think it would be really good if they could be placed in other work-study positions, and there are definitely a lot out there. but i really have no idea how many student aides there are.
@photo? The magnetic swipe strip is on the same side as the bar code…
@nope they’re not armed (for the best in my opinion) but i hear they carry tasers? there were a couple comments/posts about guards and tasers a while back so im sure someone can or will clarify.
besides, vatech has a police department on campus and this happened so arming guards doesn’t necessarily mean much. half the times the guards are dozing off when im pulling my id out of my pocket, so having a gun could be ineffective anyway. (im not criticizing guards mind you, while obviously they should always be alert i can understand their position)
@alma i see what you mean, but i guess at this stage they don’t want to put students at risk. it’s a huge liability. you’re right to question the effectiveness of guards, however.
this shooting is a clear example that every school needs to revisit their emergency plans.
@mater I don’t think they should use student aides at all. Students who sit there reading a book or watching youtube just aren’t capable of more than swiping cards. the job isn’t about swiping cards; it’s about keeping an eye on the building.
@alma To be fair, after a huge tragedy like this there’s a greater chance of copycat crimes being committed soon after.
Are the guards here armed? I think it would make sense that they want to have only guards if they were armed.