The new face of Campus Safety

NAYONIKAA SINGHAAL
PHOTOGRAPH

GRACE MAIN
EDITOR

2/9/2026

Former Alma College Associate Director of Residence Life, Nicholas Benjamin, took over the position of Director of Campus Safety and Student Conduct in November.

Campus Safety oversees the campus security officers, manages crises on campus and ensures that protocol is up to date and well executed for emergency response situations; while Student Conduct evaluates the student handbook and helps students get back on their correct paths after policy is broken. These departments are now merged together under Benjamin.

“I’ve been overseeing student conduct here for about three, four years. So when this opportunity came up, it made a lot of sense to merge both departments together, with the goal of getting all the accountability work to come from a central office or location,” said Benjamin.

In his first three months in this role, Benjamin has been working very close with the campus safety officers, who are employed by a third party company, STT Security, in making sure everyone is up to date on protocol and procedures. This has included mental health and First Aid training.

“My short-term goal was to be pretty quick to get them up to speed so that if there’s an incident on campus, they can respond effectively for the safety of our students. Not that I think they couldn’t have before, but I really wanted to emphasize that we’re here for the safety of our students and to make sure they had those foundational skills,” said Benjamin.

Eventually, Benjamin’s goal is to transition campus officers into the leading roles in critical incidents rather than being an Administrator on Duty (AOD) or other college staff member as it has been historically. To do this, outreach, programming and accessibility of officers will be broadened.

“I think that from a student perspective, they’re looking for the campus safety person to come and be able to control the situation, rectify the situation. Not that I want to invalidate the partnership between the AOD and campus safety because it’s a great partnership, but I would really like to empower the officers to make decisions on their own after hours and during regular hours as well,” said Benjamin.

Benjamin is now transitioning into this new role from his former experience in Residence Life, which he has worked in since 2013 when he himself was a Residence Assistant. Although this is a new adjustment, that Residence Life experience has made the transition easier.

“My trajectory has led to the crisis work on a college campus, and I’ve been looking for that ability in my next position to do that. So, when this came up, I was very excited to take this role because this is what I’ve been looking to do in my career for the next step,” said Benjamin.

In this age and with the incident that happened on campus in October, it is important for an attentive and responsive Campus Safety department.

“I think the emergency management side of the college is never something that you all want to think about as students. But unfortunately, we live in a time where we can have something horrific happen on campus any day. We really want to make sure that we’re prepared for those things, that way we’re minimizing any harm done,” said Benjamin.

For questions or feedback concerning the Campus Safety or Student Conduct procedures and policies, contact benjaminna@alma.edu.

“Our goal is making sure that everyone at the end of the day is safe and they were able to have the best four years of their life, and our office is going to strive to ensure that we are supporting students at their best,” said Benjamin.