A Quantitative Analysis of Crime Rates in American Colleges and Universities With and Without Residential College Systems.

The purpose of this quantitative study was to examine the residential college system to determine if there was any association between campus crime and the residential house system. The specific problem of this study was to determine the effectiveness of the residential college system in mitigating campus violence. The intent of this study was to analyze the statistical relationship between crime reports from colleges and universities where on-campus housing was structured into residential colleges or house systems and crime reports from comparable colleges and universities without the residential design. Data collection consisted of a Web-based nationwide survey conducted annually by the U.S. Department of Education. Data collected for this study were for 2006. The 2 groups of institutions that made up the population for this study were 27 colleges that incorporated some variation of the residential college system or house system matched with 27 comparable institutions without the residential system. The results indicated there were significant differences between institutions with residential college systems and those without such systems for the on-campus aggravated assault offenses and the on campus residence halls aggravated assault offenses. Findings showed fewer aggravated assaults in the group of institutions with residential college systems. A 3rd statistically significant difference was found in the category of arrests for the on-campus residence halls liquor law violations, with the group of nonresidential institutions showing fewer arrests than those without the residential college housing design