In the police report, it’s typical to see a description of the person who allegedly committed the crime in pathetically vague terms:

Male, 6′, 18-30, wearing jeans, dark hoodie.

That covers a lot of folks, some nice, one (at least) maybe not so much. Oh wait, there’s one additional piece included in every description: race. On the one hand, it serves the purpose of limiting the field of people who stand to be thrown against the wall or have guns pointed at their heads. On the other, it can be costly at the University of Minnesota.

The University of Minnesota has agreed to pay $65,000 to a former employee who claimed she was fired for speaking “candidly and passionately” against the racial profiling of African-Americans on campus.

Alysia Lajune, 41, was hired in March 2012 as assistant director of orientation and the transfer experience, according to a federal lawsuit she filed last May.

Lajune, who is black, said she soon became concerned about a lack of racial diversity and re-established the Black Faculty and Staff Association, serving as its president.

So far, nothing out of the ordinary. If anything, Lajune’s “candid and passionate” speech seems remarkably ordinary. But she went a step further.

In that role, she spoke out against the use of racial descriptors in university crime alerts, which often identified suspects as black males. Black students and staff complained that the alerts made them feel less safe and less welcome on campus.

One might suspect that having someone roaming the campus who would point a gun in their face and rob them, or rape them, or do them harm, would have black students and staff “feel less safe and welcome” too.

The problem is that Lajune saw descriptors as encouraging profiling.

But Albert’s demeanor changed after a January 2014 forum on racial profiling, which was organized by an associate dean and featured Kaler and Wheelock, among others.

From the audience, Lajune spoke for three and a half minutes, describing her experience of being followed by a police officer in Dinkytown and criticizing Wheelock for downplaying concerns about racial profiling on campus.

She said it was “a little insulting” for Wheelock to say the U has had no complaints of racial profiling when Lajune’s group had given her numerous examples.

“You don’t need an official report to know that it’s happening,” she said.

The Albert referred to above was Katrice Albert, vice president of the Office for Equity and Diversity. Lajune was her assistant. Kaler was the president, and Wheelock the vice president. And Lajune went after them in a public forum.

Regardless of whether Lajune was right about the university’s position on racial profiling per se, one would suspect that attacking your boss in public isn’t a really good career move. And so Lajune sued and the matter settled.

Under the settlement agreement, reached March 10 after a 13-hour conference, Lajune will get $39,000 from the U. Her lawyer, Zorislav Leyderman, will get $26,000.

The university did not admit to any wrongdoing. Lajune agreed she never again would seek employment at the U.

Five months after Lajune left, the university changed its crime-alert procedure. Alerts now include racial descriptors only when police have additional details that might help identify a suspect.

In a letter announcing the change, Kaler said the previous practice may have “unintentionally reinforce(d) racist stereotypes of black men and other people of color as criminals and threats.”

This creates an awkward problem for the school. Schools are required to provide notification of threats (think shooter on campus), but only so far?

Federal law requires that colleges and universities give timely warnings about serious safety threats on campus, but critics say the U’s routine use of racial descriptors in crime alerts has made campus unwelcoming and less safe for people of color.

So how is that supposed to work?

Officials now plan to provide no description of a suspect unless “there is sufficient detail that would help identify a specific individual or group.”

A review of 51 crime alerts since 2012 found that suspect descriptions in 15 cases would not have met the new criteria.

Pamela Wheelock, vice president for university services, said she and the campus police chief will decide case by case whether to give a description of the suspect, including race, gender and other identifiers, such as clothing or tattoos.

It’s not that racial profiling doesn’t happen, or that it’s not a problem. But it’s not the same problem as using whatever descriptors are available to alert people to a threat. Descriptions are almost invariably vague; they always have been. Sex and race are typically obvious descriptors, as are clothing and general age. And they usually describe a great many people, because that’s the nature of vague descriptions.

But this shift in descriptions means that if all the campus police know about a guy who might rob, rape or kill some kid is the usual generic descriptors, they’ll put out a BOLO for “person who just raped someone”? That will certainly make everyone feel more safe and welcoming for everyone. Right up to the moment they get raped because they have no clue who to look out for.