When visiting universities during recruitment tours, many students and parents want to know if the student will be ‘safe’ while attending the institution. This paper uses a qualitative examination of security at a Canadian university to argue that the increase in security measures on campuses is driven by both the desire to provide physical security and the pressure from the increasing corporatization of academia to use security as a recruitment and retention tool. These goals can be served by the same security measures or compete for budgetary priority. Overall, this study demonstrates how the concepts of corporatization, institutional risk management, security theatre, and university branding are present in how the university designs security policies and brands itself as a ‘safe’ environment, and how this can leave students wanting.

在招募旅行中访问大学时，许多学生和家长想知道学生在就读该机构时是否“安全”。本文通过对加拿大一所大学的安全性进行定性检验，认为校园安全措施的增加既是出于提供人身安全的愿望，也是由于学术界公司化的压力越来越大，他们将安全用作招聘和保留工具。这些目标可以通过相同的安全措施来实现，也可以争夺预算优先级。总体而言，这项研究表明，在大学如何将安全政策和品牌本身设计为“安全”环境时，如何体现公司化，机构风险管理，安全剧院和大学品牌的概念，以及这如何使学生感到匮乏。