Four days after a student murdered 32 members of the Virginia Tech community, students at Georgetown continue to mourn their fellow students. In the days following the event, students gathered at interfaith prayer services to pray for their neighbors in Blacksburg. Flags at half-mast reflect the haze of grief and concern that is covering university campuses across the country.

But between the tears, several questions remain unanswered. Why would one student so mercilessly attack his classmates? Did Virginia Tech’s administration and campus police respond appropriately? And could something like this happen on the Hilltop?

It is not our place to comment on the actions of the Virginia Tech administration. But the events in Blacksburg remind us of serious threats for all of today’s college students, and how important it is that students and administrators stay mindful of the procedures that may be necessary to address violent crime on or near their campuses.

Violent crime is all too common in Georgetown. In 2000, a university employee was paralyzed after a cab driver shot him. Since 2005, gun violence has injured two students within two blocks of campus – one, in Alumni Square, was shot in the head. And countless students have been mugged or assaulted while walking through the streets of Georgetown late at night. Following many of these events, students typically expect to be notified by a brief, largely uninformative e-mail from the Department of Public Safety the next day – if they are notified at all.

Students have understood the severity of the threat of violent crime, but the events of this week have led many of us to wonder if Georgetown is doing everything it can to keep its students safe.

It must be noted that the university has accomplished several noteworthy goals in the past few years. The addition of the SafeRides program gives students the ability to comfortably and safely travel around the neighborhood late at night. A program that pays off-duty Metropolitan Police Department officers to patrol the area around campus has been extended to at least next semester. And a union representing officers of the Department of Public Safety won a major victory for its members last month, increasing starting salaries for all officers.

Each of these events was a step toward a safer campus community. But students across the country deserve to have complete confidence in their university’s efforts to prevent crime. This is not our parents’ Georgetown, and ours are not their generation’s security concerns. Events such as those that happened at Virginia Tech are rare and unexpected, but are certainly no longer the types of behavior that university officials can ignore.

Crime has increased since off-duty police patrols began earlier this semester. The DeGioia administration fought for nearly a month to keep DPS salaries below a competitive or even acceptable living wage and wavered for more than a year while emergency call boxes remain inoperable. Such events indicate that Georgetown still has work to do.

No place is completely safe. The students, faculty and staff at Virginia Tech could not have expected that their campus would be subjected to a murderous rampage. And neither should we at Georgetown. But Virginia Tech’s tragedy will be a turning point in campus safety: Small projects and lip service from univeristy administrators and the Office of Communications have ceased to be sufficient in the eyes of students and parents.

As we continue to mourn for our fellow students at Virginia Tech, we can honor them most appropriately by ensuring that future generations of Hoyas, Hokies and undergraduates everywhere can live and study without fear. Our tribute to their memory should be a memorial of safety.