The University of Utah’s Presidential Internship program gives undergraduate students the opportunity to contribute to strategic projects that advance the U’s goals, while providing campus leadership with valuable insight into the student experience.

The Department of Public Safety’s Chief Safety Office has hosted presidential interns for several years. This year, Chief Safety Officer Keith Squires was eager to gain deeper insights into students’ perception of safety on campus and use that feedback to help inform police and security responses.

“This project directly aligns with our department’s data-driven approach to campus safety,” said Squires. “We regularly analyze crime incident trends to better understand and prevent crime, but capturing students’ perception of specific areas of campus can be more challenging.”

In Spring 2025, presidential intern Celine Cardeña launched the project by gathering initial student feedback and drafting a survey to identify campus locations perceived as unsafe, along with the factors influencing those perceptions. In Fall 2025, presidential intern Cheryl Qian advanced the effort by formalizing and coordinating the survey, collecting additional feedback at student events and mapping the results alongside actual crime incident data to pinpoint areas of concern.

“Feeling safe looks different for everyone, and that matters just as much as actual safety,” said Qian. “I hoped this project could help turn those experiences into actions that make the campus feel safer for all students.”

Qian worked with several university departments to capture and analyze student feedback for the project. This included the University Analytics & Institutional Research team to administer the survey, the Department of Public Safety’s crime data analyst and the GIS team within University Information Technology to visualize specific locations against actual crime data and reported public safety incidents.

In April 2026, Qian presented her findings to the Department of Public Safety’s command staff, which includes leadership from University Police, Campus Security, Health Security and Emergency Management. The mapping tool she developed will allow Department of Public Safety staff to view student safety perceptions alongside reported crime data, helping inform future patrol strategies and operational responses.