Reasonable Security, or Unnecessary Burden?

As I sit here in 30th Street Station, waiting patiently for my train to come and bring me home, there is a presence here that no one can ignore. That presence is the police. Many armed police officers, some with dogs, are wandering around the station. They are here looking for anything that seems out of the ordinary. Now I am not complaining about their presence, in fact, I feel much safer with them here. They play an important role in preventing crime and terrorism in our country, especially in a transportation hub such as this one. But the question that I now ask is, is this same presence needed elsewhere? Is a heavy police presence needed or even necessary in a place such as a school?
I was pleasantly surprised when I came to Drexel to see the efficiency of the security here. In a big city campus, in a city with a somewhat large crime rate, you would expect the security here to be efficient. Unlike in some colleges, the Public Safety organization here is not a police department, but instead they work with the city police. Their presence and their close relationship with the police help to deter crime from happening, but their limited authoritative power deters them from hassling students or other people. The security here for individual buildings is effective in that you need a card in order to scan yourself into the buildings. It is in my last statement where security is the most important, and that is in access. If a criminal, or someone who shouldn’t be in a particular place, cannot get into that place, then there is little need for the security inside that building. For example, you don’t need bomb-sniffing dogs inside the vault of Fort Knox, if no one can get into the vault anyway.
I have seen schools that are very easy to infiltrate, but once inside, there is a ton of unnecessary security, that in the end, only tend to piss off students and others. Security is important, but not at the expense of certain freedoms. I went to a friend’s college the other weekend, and the security there was painful. Not only was I able to easily sneak in, but people there thought I was just another student. But, since I wanted to be the responsible law abiding citizen that I am, I went through hell trying to get registered to stay there. This doesn’t prevent crime; this only punishes those who try to do the right thing. This college is not the example of a school with good security, although they had a large presence, they were only there to punish, and not prevent.
I think that the difference between effective and ineffective security lies in their purpose. If their purpose is to punish, then the security is ineffective, because by punishing, you are not stopping crime from happening, you are only punishing those who already committed a crime. If the crime in question is a shooting or a robbery, then the damage is already done. An effective security is one that prevents crime. Having a presence and stopping bad people from “getting in” is the key to safety, and the key to not stepping on people’s freedoms. When a crime is committed, some people will do whatever it takes to punish those responsible, and this could step on any number of individual freedoms. A random search, or an accusation, are all violations of a person’s freedom; their freedom from persecution.
This is not only happening at the college level, it is also happening at the high school and elementary school level. I worked for a computer technician for my school for a little over a year, and I was involved in security. I was involved in implementing a system of cards that provide access to buildings. Before that though, it was very easy for people to come and go from any school building. Then they created a system where everyone had to sign into a building when they came it, and the problem with that is that it lets people come into the building, the good people just have to make sure they check into the main office, even employees with ID cards.
When someone has to be “hassled”, they tend to feel violated, and they feel that their freedom to do what they please has been violated. Poorly designed security at places like schools can exacerbate this feeling of being hassled. When it is possible for anyone to get into a place, then the security there treats everyone like criminals. Security needs to be designed to accommodate the people who do the right things, and prevents the people who wish to do bad things from having a chance. Personal freedom should never be sacrificed in order to accommodate security. Security needs to be able to be flexible in order to accommodate people’s freedoms. There are good models and bad models, and luckily I go to Drexel, which is a good model of effective security.