How safe are college campuses?

University officials are starting to ask tough questions about what they can learn from the worst shooting in United States history.

Many colleges adopted new security plans and procedures in the wake of the 1999 Columbine high school and other mass shootings. But preventing – and reacting to – such attacks poses a daunting challenge to campuses that treasure open environments and oftenbucolic settings that encompass hundreds of buildings.

"The world has changed and we now have to think about balancing the open campus with the secure campus," says Dennis Black, a vice president at the University at Buffalo, noting that this is a wake-up call. "It's Charles Whitman [who killed 16 at the University of Texas in 1966] and Columbine rolled into one."

Already, Virginia Tech, where 32 people were killed Tuesday by a student who then killed himself, is under attack for not locking down campus after the first of two shootings. But experts note that tighter security in the aftermath of violence isn't always effective. Instead, some argue, universities must focus more on preventive measures like outreach and helping students identify early signs of trouble.

"For a period of time, colleges and universities will take the law-and-order approach, and it will make students and professors and administrators feel safer. They won't be safer, but they'll feel safer, and that isn't a small thing," says Jack Levin, director of the Brudnick Center on Violence and Conflict at Northeastern University.

Determined shooters will always find a way to get to people, he says, noting that in at least one past case, shooters pulled a fire alarm and waited until students filed out before opening fire. "You can't make college buildings into safe havens," he adds. While most people who exhibit warning signs will never pick up a gun, trying to reach them early on to make them feel less isolated can only help, he says. "If we wait until they want to kill a lot of people, it's too late."

Random mass shootings have generally been rare at colleges. Before the Virginia Tech massacre, the worst campus shooting took place in 1966 at the University of Texas at Austin, when Charles Whitman killed 16 people from the observation deck of a clock tower before he was gunned down. Instead, colleges have tended to focus on assaults, rapes, and other violent crimes. Since the "Clery Act" was enacted in 1990 – named for Jeanne Clery, raped and murdered in her Lehigh University dorm room – colleges have been required to report violent crimes on campus and notify students when it takes place. Such crimes have tended to mirror national statistics, dropping sharply between 1994 and 2002 and edging up since then, says Lori Sudderth, director of Quinnipiac University's criminal justice program.

"We are in a better situation than we were 10 to 20 years ago," Professor Sudderth says. "Victims of violence have more ways to report it than before." In 2005, FBI statistics show that Virginia Tech, with a student body of 27,619, had only four reported violent crimes – fairly typical for a large university. However, Sudderth says, the reported numbers usually underestimate the problem, with crimes like sexual assaults often vastly underreported.

Like Levin, Sudderth hopes the Virginia Tech incident makes universities look more closely at security and ways to treat students with mental-health problems. "I would hope we at least ask, 'What do you look for in a violent offender? How do you intervene earlier?'"

While locking down an entire campus or putting metal detectors in every building may not be feasible, there are some physical security measures universities can do. Many have already locked dormitories, for instance.

Installing monitored TV systems could also help, says Paul Viollis, CEO of Risk Control Strategies. That could have helped police at Virginia Tech target the shooter after the first incident was called in, he says, since stopping and frisking thousands of students isn't feasible. "The security architecture of college campuses needs to be improved," Mr. Viollis says. "But for the most part, that will assist in reacting.... The preventative part is really the key....When you put a Band-Aid on the outside, the cause is still there."

Faculty and students, he says, could be educated on what signs to look for – someone who's socially isolated, has low self-worth, doesn't take criticism well, and may have put out early signals about his intentions in the hope of getting someone to intercede.

In the case of Virginia Tech, the shooter, a senior from South Korea, may have posted worrisome comments in his online profile. The Associated Press reported that his creative writing in class was so disturbing that he was referred for counseling. That's the sort of thing that should be report to authorities, says Beverly Glenn, director of George Washington University's Hamilton Fish Institute on School and Community Violence. Her organization has trained resident assistants in dorms in understand ing warning signs – something she'd like to see more of. She'd also like to see universities create rules outlawing possession of weapons. That issue arose at the University of Utah last year, when a law was passed allowing students 21 or older to bring firearms to campus if they have a permit.

"We have a lot of boys and young men who don't know how to deal with their feelings of rage or depression or being broken-hearted or any of the other kinds of normal emotions," Dr. Glenn notes. "You have to try to teach people that guns are not a way to resolve things."

Some campuses have already taken significant steps to boost security, and many more say they'll revisit their plans now.

Mr. Black says that before Columbine, protocol was to wait out the shooter and try to negotiate. "Now, we've discovered every second could be a death, so training has changed – we need to get in quickly, effectively, and safely. We need to take risks to save lives."

Now, he expects campuses to install more cameras and practice their "active shooter response."

"We will begin to close buildings that don't need to be open to the public," he says. "The library, concert halls will be open, but our laboratories and our classroom buildings may need swipe cards for access, just like residence halls."

At Arizona State University in Tempe, officials expect to review what happened at Virginia Tech, and possibly adjust their current crisis plans. The university sends out flyers and updates its website when there are situations, such as armed robberies. "We also have general safety briefings for students and residence assistants," says Police Commander Jim Hardina. "People tend not to take security seriously until [an incident like Virginia Tech] happens, and then we find they are hyper-vigilant. But, after a few days or months, they go back to their everyday ways."