Danger and Depravity at Dickinson

Originally published October 12, 2006

Recently residents of my dorm and a few other dorms on Morgan field were called to a meeting in the Basement of Adams. I didn’t really want to go, but I thought it might supply me with some good material for this article. It certainly did. I learned things I would have been much happier not knowing.
Roughly one hundred of us met in the Adams basement. The meeting was led by a DPS officer who started telling us some basic things. Like lock your doors, don’t use the emergency exits, don’t prop the doors open and such. But then the meeting took a disturbing turn. He started going over crimes that had happened in the town and school. Apparently our school has a higher crime rate than any other schools near us, including in Harrisburg. There was a homicide last year and very large amounts of drug and sex crimes as well. At the school, he told us of two cases of crime on campus. The first was a truck driver from Atlanta was wandering around Drayer. Apparently he was looking for some parties and to hook up with some girls. DPS arrested him for trespassing; when he was searched they found drug paraphernalia on him.
The second event was even more horrifying. Earlier this semester a girl walked into the HUB through the entrance near the two computers. She then saw a man masturbating to pornographic sites on one of the computers near the entrance. I AM NOT JOKING. She then went to call DPS, and the guy started following her with his pants down. Fortunately, he stopped after she left the HUB. DPS arrived and the man tried to shake one of the officer’s hands while his pants were still down.
At that point in the meeting everyone had come close to soiling themselves. Apparently our campus has become somewhat of a magnet for disorderly drunks and all manners of perverts. At least that’s what the meeting made it seem like.
So is our college campus and the Carlisle area conducive to depraved behavior? Maybe, but we can do about it? Nothing. There is nothing that will stop people from wandering on to our campus, every now and then a crazy person will wander in here. We simply will have to accept that fact. Since there is nothing we can do, there is no reason to worry about it. Here’s a positive way to look at this, we’ll all have great stories to tell our friends. All the stuff that happens here has given me loads of material to write about, and things to talk about for my inevitable Psychologist sessions later in life. There is one thing that I want to happen as a result of this article. I want the computers in the HUB thoroughly cleaned and disinfected; I’m not touching them until they are.