Clarion University to introduce campus safety smart phone app

There’s an app for nearly everything and, next fall, Clarion University students will have the opportunity to tap one designed to fight sexual violence on campus.

Officials at Clarion said the state-owned university located about 75 miles north of Pittsburgh will use a state grant to launch LiveSafe, a mobile smart phone app designed to enhance student safety and make anonymous reporting easier.

A spokesman for LiveSafe said the smart phone app, first marketed in 2008, is now used on about 175 campuses across the country and has been adopted across a variety of industries and public sectors as well.

Meredith Karg, student support assistant at Clarion, said the app will be available by the start of the fall 2020 semester.

“LiveSafe will allow, among other things, the ability for anonymous reporting, a peer-to-peer virtual walk-along service, and access to emergency responders anywhere in the world,” Karg said.

A new state law required all Pennsylvania colleges and universities to have systems in place to allow for anonymous reporting of sexual assault this year.

Clarion was among 36 Pennsylvania colleges and universities that shared in $1 million of state grants averaging about $25,000. The grants were disbursed through the state’s “It’s on Us PA” program, a Wolf Administration program that has awarded approximately $4 million in grants aimed at reducing sexual violence on campuses.