Coverage Limits
What the archive can and cannot show.
Coverage describes the public documentation currently present in Campus Evidence Lab. It is a map of available records, not a census of campus experience.
Current Coverage
Coverage describes public documentation present in this archive. It does not measure underlying incident prevalence, campus safety, institutional virtue, or the absence of harm.
Source-Type Coverage
The archive currently includes government datasets, government letters, government releases, government case summaries, public safety notices, university statements, guidance documents, and annual security reports. Each source type has different blind spots.
Time-Period Limits
Records can cluster around the dates when public datasets, agency actions, or school statements became available. That clustering should not be read as a complete trend without source-specific review.
School-Presence Limits
A school appearing in the archive means at least one public-source record is present. A school not appearing, or appearing with fewer records, does not prove fewer underlying events or better conditions.
Import-Pathway Limits
Structured imports can add scale but may carry less narrative context. Imported records should be reviewed with special attention to source fields, date precision, aggregation keys, and broad labels.
Known Blind Spots
- Private reports and sealed records.
- Incidents never reported publicly.
- Records that are public but difficult to discover.
- Sources that moved, expired, or require archival replacement.
- Differences in school reporting practices and agency workflows.
- student-newsroom capacity, including whether a campus paper exists, publishes consistently, archives older stories, and has staff available to cover civil-rights matters.
Responsible Use
Use coverage signals to decide where to inspect source material, ask better questions, or request comment. Do not convert coverage into rankings, prevalence estimates, safety scores, or claims about institutional virtue.