New Security Camera System at Dean, Should You Be Worried?
- Richard Struzziery
- Nov 18
- 2 min read
Students and faculty have started to notice a new camera located outside of the Paula M. Rooney Student Center at Dean College. Should you be worried about it?
Questions have been raised and brought to the attention of The Dean Daily to investigate what changes were made, and why the changes were made. The Dean Daily had the privilege to sit down and talk with the Chief of Campus Police and Safety Ken Corkran and Captain of the Campus Police and Safety Department Erica Abro.
We first asked what changes were made to the security camera system. Chief Corkran responded saying “Not many changes were really made, just the one for the Student Center to get better views of people leaving and entering.” Chief Corkran then added “This was really just to ensure the right people are entering and leaving the building. If someone who isn’t supposed to be there walks in our building, then our video surveillance officer will catch that”. The video surveillance officer is located behind the desk at Campus Safety in Dean Hall.
The Dean Daily then asked if anything had happened around the country with schools that sparked the idea of getting these changes made. Captain Abro said, “Nothing like that, we have had these plans in our books for a while now and this just happened to be when everything fully came together”. Captain Abro then stated, “Talking with surrounding schools and comparing our systems to the others, Dean has one of the best security camera systems compared to surrounding schools”. This makes sense as Dean College is one of the safest schools in the country.
Captain Abro spoke about the fact that we are lucky to have the budget we have here. Stating “Fortunately for us we have been able to put more money into our security camera systems than other schools have”.
Chief Corkran added to Captain Abro’s comments by saying “The Franklin Police Department will often contact us if they believe one of our security cameras captured footage of a crime” also adding “Our security cameras capture footage from a great distance”. Notable things Chief Corkran said would often be found are things like vehicle hit and runs or property damage.
And according to the Dean College annual security and fire and safety report, this only backs up what the Chief and Captain said. With reports showing crime statistics for criminal offenses on and adjacent to the Dean College campus from 2022-2024. Highlights from the charts are zero reports of domestic violence, manslaughter, motor vehicle theft, and aggravated assaults.
Overall, should Dean students be concerned with the new security camera system? Absolutely not. Chief Ken Corkran and Captain Erica Abro were extremely helpful and insightful on the new security camera system and gave us the details as to what the purpose of adding them was for.
