This small scale pilot project was undertaken in partnership with Crimestoppers, an independent charitable organisation in the United Kingdom.  The focus was to assess student’s perceptions of crime and crime prevention strategies and understand their level of knowledge of support services.  Through a semi structured survey, disseminated electronically to students at University of Lincoln,  the project promoted the awareness of crime prevention strategies in place to support students.

The project was innovative through its promotion of collaborative partnership approaches to research with external organisations.  The project enabled students to work collectively with both academics, and practitioners. Students were involved at all levels of the project, including the initial research design and analysis of data stages.  The project was explored the development of employability skills through personal and professional development of self-awareness, providing opportunities for volunteering. In essence, the pilot project established relationships with key external support organisations, Crimestoppers and enhanced their impact within the student community.

The success of the project was measured through a semi structured survey distributed to students at the University of Lincoln. With very high response rate, findings indicated differential levels of knowledge among the cohorts with a relationship between the year of study and levels of awareness. Students new to their programmes were least aware, but were arguably the most vulnerable group.  Awareness of Victim Support and Police drop in services was greater in our College of Social Science compared to other Colleges. Outcomes of this project have included the production of student-friendly materials on crime prevention advice, blogs and information areas on University websites and digital spaces. These are now being disseminated across the institution.