Darkness served as an advantage at last night’s semi-annual “Walk for Light,” an event organized in collaboration with the Campus Safety Summit.

A group of 11 campus employees and eight students gathered on the front steps of the Student Union at 6:30 p.m. to walk around a moonlit campus and look for potential safety problems. Included in the group were Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs Javier Cevallos, University of Massachusetts Police Officer Dave Black and representatives from the Physical Plant and the Student Government Association.

“It’s quality, not quantity,” said Chief of Police Barbara O’Connor in reference to the group’s size. “We have a lot of quality assembled here.”

The individuals broke up into four groups with one exploring the safety of the Goodell and Southwest areas, another in the academic area or the core of campus, another group traveling by foot through Orchard Hill and Central and the final group looking at the safety of the areas north of Totman, the Northeast residence area and the Sylvan residence area.

O’Connor explained that people within the groups should be on the lookout for such things as broken lights, areas that were dark and potentially dangerous, places where more call boxes may be needed, areas where the shrubbery was overgrown and problems with walkways. She went on to explain that broken lights were easily identifiable and recordable because of the individual numbers on the poles.

Once all of the groups had returned their lists of safety concerns would be complied and given to the Physical Plant. Later, the Physical Plant and the UMPD will work together to see that call boxes and new lights are installed into areas that need them most.

Through programs like this the campus has been able to put more call boxes and lights in place. The walk, which takes place every semester, began in 1997 and was organized by the Campus Safety Summit, a committee that meets to address campus safety issues.

In 1980 there were only five call boxes installed. O’Connor explained that now there are over 100. Previous safety walks have resulted in the implementation of a number of new call boxes, improved lighting on campus and the pruning of shrubbery for safety purposes.

“The safety walk is a great idea,” O’Connor said.

One of the areas that was spotted and isolated as a potentially dangerous spot was near the outside of Worcester Dining Hall. O’Connor suggested that it may be a good idea to place lights on the side of the building because at night when the dining hall is closed it may serve as a dangerous place for students to walk alone.

“From our perspective someone could be standing behind that tree,” O’Connor explained how the lack of light could become a dangerous situation.

Other areas that were isolated as possible places that could present safety problems were areas with overgrown shrubbery and some broken lights in the parking lot behind Sylvan dormitory. Also suggested in the walk-through was the placement of a light on the side of Cashin Dormitory to illuminate a particularly dark portion of dormitory and the additional of lights in the area of the McNamara walkway.

O’Connor cited fewer automobile break-ins in the parking lots near the Sylvan area, specifically in lot 40, because of increased lighting there.

“I can tell you from experience that Sylvan used to be really dark,” O’Connor explained about the progress that safety walks has allowed. “Overall we found a couple things, but not anything really major.”