A few years ago a guy asked me a question as I was about to enter my college apartment — “You live alone?” His inquiry chilled me. I didn’t want to turn around, but I knew I should. I looked at him and replied, “No, I live with my brother.”

That silenced any other questions he had, and with some mumbled response he continued on his way. Maybe he was a poor conversationalist, or perhaps he was casing out my situation—probably the former, but who knows.

I told my dad and he sent me pepper spray, a safeguard, a line of defense just in case. There was no question, hesitation, or “aren’t you overreacting?”—he just acted. That’s how people should react when informed of an uncomfortable or potentially dangerous situation. Don’t tell me I’m overreacting, just act accordingly and help. I’m at school to learn, not feel threatened and alone.

College is a place that you’re supposed to feel free, uninhibited, and able to discover yourself. But all too often, directly or indirectly, we are affected by assault.

For me it was indirectly. The university would send emails informing students of attempted or completed assaults, students would discuss rumors in class or in common areas, victims would share their experiences. If it didn’t happen to you, you still knew about it. You can’t deny or ignore the existence of rape or assault just because it hasn’t happened to you.

All this stems from U.S. News & World Report’s decision not to include data on college campus assaults when ranking colleges because, as their spokeswoman Lucy Lyons says, it is “not usable to measure relative campus safety among colleges.” They don’t believe there is appropriate data available and wouldn’t be able to compare “apples to apples.”

If the Department of Education can identify 55 schools violating Title IX for how they handle sexual assault, clearly there is data available to reach those conclusions.

There’s also this little thing called the Cleary Act, also known as the Campus Safety Act, which requires universities participating in federal student financial aid programs to disclose information about campus crime. The data may not be perfect, but it definitely exists. But hey, I’m no statistician.

Unfortunately, U.S. News doesn’t actually care if the data exists or not. They’ve already said they don’t intend to use it. Why? They don’t think it matters.

“Campus safety is not among the factors U.S. News believes is directly tied to academic quality, and we believe that it should not be part of our main ranking methodology, even if it could be measured,” said their data director Robert Morse.

Contrary to Morse’s opinion that safety has no affect on academic success, the data suggests otherwise.

Dealing with assault isn’t easy. There are serious, long lasting effects of sexual assault that impact not just a victim’s academic experience but the rest of their life:

• 40% of rape survivors develop sexually transmitted infections due to the assault
• 80% of survivors suffer chronic physical or psychological problems
• Survivors are 13x more likely to attempt suicide
• They are 6x more likely to attempt suicide than are survivors of other crimes.
• 25–50% of survivors seek mental health treatment because of the assault

Rape and assault can have detrimental affects upon an individual’s future in more ways than one—physically, emotionally, mentally, and they can even cripple one’s academic future and aspirations.

A college student who has been sexually assaulted may no longer perform at their usual level of academic achievement. Their normal class load may become too much. They may start missing classes regularly. They may withdraw socially to avoid situations that feel similar, the location where the attack occurred, or to avoid possibly running into their attacker. Sometimes students will leave college for a time, or even transfer schools. In short, every aspect of a student’s education and life is affected by an assault.

Nearly 1 in 5 women have been raped or experienced an attempted rape. That’s something to keep in mind the next time you get together with 4 girlfriends to study, watch a movie, or go out to dinner — statistically one of you could become a victim of assault. If a college had a higher rate of assault, wouldn’t you want to know before you got there?

I would not have been able to reach my full potential, or perform as well as I would’ve liked in my classes if I had been worried about being assaulted before or after class, or while walking home in the evening, or as I enter my apartment. I certainly wouldn’t have performed at the same level if I’d been dealing with the trauma of an assault.

It’s pretty bold to say that campus safety is not a factor tied to academic success. It should be an important factor students weigh when making they’re college decisions, but they’re not getting all the information.

In an article written in response to U.S. News’s decision, Donna Wick, Ed. D, said, “I have to tell you, as the mother of a high school junior, parents, schools and college counselors take the U.S. News & World Report rankings very seriously. They are a hugely influential factor in how millions of people make college decisions every year.”

Omitting such information and claiming that it’s irrelevant is both irresponsible and dangerous. The data exists and could change the futures of students heading to college.

If we’re determined to continue claiming a woman’s safety is solely her responsibility, the least we can do is provide the resources for her to make informed decisions.