MICHAEL WILLIAMS
Special to The Leader
Over the past month, more than 400 Fredonia students participated in a campus-wide survey. The survey collected information about the students, their interactions with University Police and their opinion of UP.
Police relationships with communities in America have been rocky throughout history. Whether you examine the lives of Michael Brown, Breonna Taylor or George Floyd, the United States is constantly reassessing its role in race relations and policing.
Dr. Jessica Finkeldey, an assistant professor of criminal justice in the sociocultural and justice sciences department, created the survey. She noted that there’s not much research on how campus police interact with students in comparison to local or state police.
Most research indicates that police stop minorities at higher rates than white people even if they commit the same crimes per capita.
Finkeldey told me that her research did not show that to be the case within the University Police Department staff. For example, among white students who completed the questionnaire, 59.7% reported having any contact with Fredonia University Police, and among non-white students, 58.8% reported having contact.
“This is what we want to see,” Finkeldey said.
In fact, minority students said they did not view University Police as less favorable or more favorable.
Through other data, Finkeldey showed me that University Police get less training time than local or state police, and the departments are similar in racial and ethnic makeup. Other results from the survey also indicated that liberal students were more likely to view UP in a bad light, compared to their conservative peers. Heterosexual students are more likely to view police favorably than students who identify as LGBTQ+.
One difference between departments is the slight increase in education within the UP’s force. While there are only 3% more cops than UP officers who have at least an associate’s or bachelor’s degree, 13% of UP officer job postings say they prefer to hire a candidate with college experience, compared to 10% of municipal police.
Could this be the silver bullet to solving policing problems? We’ll just have to wait and see.