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NYU Uses Magic Accounting to Fudge Dorm Crime Stats

111808nyu.jpgThe Washington Square News, NYU's student paper, has a juicy article showing how their university artificially deflates campus crime stats by classifying 87% of its residence hall population as "off campus." The exposé sensationally notes that if you're a student who "gets murdered in Rubin residence hall, you were killed off-campus. You missed the cutoff by three blocks." Because it receives federal funds, NYU is required by law to publish its annual crime statistics, but only three of NYU’s 21 undergraduate dorms are technically classified as on-campus. Looking at NYU's report, you might think the school ranks a modest 61st out of the largest 180 universities for substance abuse violations. But when campus and "non-campus" incidents are compiled together, NYU is #2 in the nation (which sounds more like it). Professor Dennis Jay Kenney tells the News, "It clearly sounds to me that they’re trying to circumvent the reporting requirements." Now NYU officials say they'll change the way they present the stats, but it's unclear if this will affect their recent announcement that it would cut back on security.

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By John Del Signore in on November 18, 2008 4:56 PM

Comments [rss]

  • Steven

    Kids go to college to get wasted and party. Going to NYU is also a nice status symbol to most kids. It makes them feel special they go there.

  • angry_pickle

    Its all about money not bettering our society



    I think it's been this way for at least a decade ... if not decades. Universities and colleges are run as corporations and with the same marketing ploys, politics and intrigue.

  • Reflect

    schools are such a fucking joke nowadays. Its all about money not bettering our society. Fuck you NYU.

  • bluesdance

    the guy in that picture is DOOMED

  • Future Taliban

    "The Audacity of Cooking Statistics and Fudging Numbers: How the USA Joined the Third World".

  • west side Michael

    Brigham Young Unv. is number one.

    Just kidding.Might be the safest as

    they are all virgin's so I heard.

  • HUGO_MEGO

    NYU NYU NYU GO VIOLETTES!!!!!

  • Kojak

    "If NYU is #2, who is #1?"



    BMCC

  • longacre

    If NYU is #2, who is #1?

  • NannyState

    Rest assured, NYU is virtually crime-free and perfectly safe for your overprivileged, spoiled little angel.

  • sinisterteashop

    Give that student reporter a job fast! But is there a newspaper in town that would print his exposés?

  • Think2wice

    Because they're not selling you an education; they're selling you an "experience".

  • Are they using the same magic accounting the MTA is using on its finances?

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