No precautions taken preventing second incident

In My Opinion

STAFF WRITER REK722@CABRINI EDU

The second stabbing isn’t so unexpected to upper classmen.

Being a resident here for four years, I have always felt safe, but that has absolutely nothing to do with Public Safety or the Radnor police or anyone who claims to be keeping us safe here on campus.

I feel safe because I know that I can run pretty fast and if I got into a compromising situation I feel like I’ll take my chances against most people.

I remember Spring Fling two years ago when the original stabbing happened, which hit much closer to home then this one because the victim happened to be someone I was friendly with.

I remember how shocked everyone was on campus and how outraged everyone was at the poor response by our Public Safety and the little or no steps that they took to im- prove the situation.

I also remember a meeting that was held in the Widener Lecture Hall where students were encouraged to come and voice their concerns.

What you heard at that meeting were real suggestions about how problems like this could be eliminated, such as screening for dangerous students in the application process and following up on dangerous reports made to the public safety office.

You would think the “higher ups” at Cabrini would heed this advice at least a little bit, but they did no such thing. Instead we saw a crack down on drink- ing? And noise violations?

Wait, wait but what about closing the exits and checking everyone at the front gate? All these precautions did was make over excited parents feel safe about sending their kids to school here. They lacked any type of rhyme or reason to implementing stricter policies that had nothing to do with the problem.

The original stabbing was premeditated, it wasn’t because kids were partying to hard and decided to play with knives, to me I doubt that would ever be the case.

If someone wants to kill me they can certainly walk right off Eagle Road and

Shunned out during lock down

In My Opinion

some place to go for a few hours.

First, where were we supposed to go at 1 a.m.? That’s a really scary feeling knowing that something terrible happened on campus, but not knowing exactly what.

going to be a long night.

STAFF WRITER SEK723@CABRINI EDU

Imagine driving back to campus at 1 a.m. after seeing a movie and going out to dinner on Friday night and not being able to get back onto campus.

As we pulled into the Upper Gulph entrance, a Public Safety officer stopped us and told us there was a “situation” and we needed to find

So we waited for a little while, hoping that the “situation” would get resolved quickly.

Meanwhile, I was calling people I knew who were on campus, hoping they could tell me what was going on. Unfortunately, no one knew.

Then, another student pulled up beside us and said there was a stabbing on campus. After that, people began calling me back with the little information they knew and I figured it was run up to me and do it, there isn’t anything that anyone can do to stop that person.

Thankfully, I had some place to go, but I’m sure not everyone did. I think it’s good that Cabrini went into lock down after the incident, but I think they should have at least escorted people to their rooms if they had no other place to go.

Considering no one was allowed to leave their building, I feel like they should have been publicly informed immediately about the incident, rather than getting an e-mail at 5:28 a.m. when the lock down was over.

Cabrini students are lucky that the school is in such a safe neighborhood and I guess it never seems like these things could happen there.

Cabrini’s policies for guests are already strict and since the stabber wasn’t a Cabrini student, they’re only going to make it a lot harder for guests to come.

No matter what, though, these things are going to happen with or without strict policies and there’s no way to predict or prevent them from happening. The only thing that they can do is to protect the students when this kind of situation arises, which they did.

Cabrini did a great job in reacting to the incident but at the same time, they shouldn’t have left people in the dark for so long.

What scares me isn’t the prospect of that actually happening, but the response by the college’s authorities if it did. If I was killed on campus they would lock down the campus and send everyone an email hours later poorly explaining what happened, when by that point everyone would have heard a million different stories.

It needs to be said by someone and I’ll be the one to do it that our Public Safety, Residence Life and anyone else who works with the resident students are just awful. I hope they are smart enough to let students voice our concerns again and I hope this time they aren’t as stupid as last.

I plead with our colleges authorities to make one right decision in my four years here, stop focusing on noise and parking tickets and red cups at sporting events and start thinking about how to handle a crisis in the right way, that’s what you’re here for, to make us feel safe, not persecuted and kept in the dark when a major event like this does happen.

Letters to the Editor Letters to the Editor Letters to the Editor

Re: Delco Times article

To the Editor: Sent to Delco Times in regards to article on Cabrini incident and mothers opinion.

To the mother of Rupert G. Tate, reading the article about the situation at Cabrini and your views on the students, I became easily frustrated, along with many other students at my school.

I am a senior graduating early this December. I work hard to attend the college. I pay for the school and every cent of what I spend per day down to car expenses and living expenses, as do many other Cabrini students.

It is horrible to say your son was hanging out with “rich white kids” and their parents just hand them money.

Although there are some more fortunate students, as there are at any other school, I would never stand up for someone, even if it was my own son, and explain how it was not his fault and students are to blame.

In any environment you will find someone who is more fortunate than yourself, however using violence is not the way to solve your problems. It is sad to see someone put down these students who spend much time on education, with or without support from their parents. Your son would not have done this if you did not raise him with these types of judgements towards “rich white kids”.

- Curtis Iorio