Vermont College Rethinks Security after Peeping Incident

BURLINGTON, Vt. (AP) - Students at Champlain College are concerned about campus security after a man entered a dormitory and watched a female student taking a shower.

"This is very scary," said Lauren Selfridge, the student outreach coordinator for the Community Service Department at the college and also a student. She organized and led Wednesday's campuswide meeting to give students and faculty a chance to talk about how to keep themselves safe and how to improve security at the school.

"There's been a definite sense of concern around campus over the last two days," she said. In what amounted to a prolonged conversation, several students at the meeting said they felt frustrated by the college administration's failure to act.

"What we need is a clear-cut 'This is what the school will do,"' one student said.

Another student said he was the victim of a beating by intruders to his dorm room last semester.

"There is a trend on campus," he said. "Nothing is done until something happens. The system is flawed. Safety issues are on the back burner."

Champlain's vice president for student services, Mary Kay Kennedy, told the group of about 40 students and staff that campus officials are taking the incident seriously, but she didn't say how the college, which enrolls about 1,700 students, would act to improve security.