Campus Driving: Cause for Concern?

In these past few school years, campus driving, especially student driving, has raised a lot of safety concerns for Upper School faculty and administration.

Upper School Dean of Students Matt Wilson said his priority, since he got the job two years ago, is students driving safely and following the campus rules.

“My biggest concern…is students driving safe speeds on campus and abiding by stop signs and crosswalks. We share a campus with two other divisions and at any given time there could be a class transitioning from building to building.”

Some students also feel the same. Sports athletes park in the Sports Center parking lot, but there are also students who aren’t playing a sport and still park in the Sports Center parking lot. One of those is Andrew Bebbington, who shares Wilson’s concerns.

“I’m worried my car is going to get hit in the student lot. I think the [lower and middle school teachers] are more mature and responsible, so I think they take more care with parking.”

The administration has come up with some solutions to help with the reckless driving on campus. Wilson says they have a couple of solutions that have been put into place, one being adding more security on campus.

“We have added to our security by adding cameras on buildings, and just around campus, to observe if there is an incident, and hopefully stop it from happening.”

Another solution that has been put into place that does not deal with security is the parking of student-athletes, who have to park in the Sports Center parking lot, which, Wilson states, helps with congestion.

There are a lot of ideas for possible solutions, but not allowing students to drive is not in the plan for one of those.

Safety is the biggest concern for the Sanford community and is being well managed by the Upper School administration. One final message from Wilson:

“Stay safe and make sure you remember you’re sharing a campus with two other divisions, and a lot of those kids are a lot younger.”