Not a student but I teach at the University of Wisconsin and commute to campus, three miles each way. Best biking town in America (according to Bicycling magazine), miles of beautiful maintained trails, I hardly have to touch an actual road to get to school and there's paths to awesome lakes and countryside in all directions. Much faster and cheaper than driving due to typical big-school traffic and parking issues. That's the good part. Smorgasbord for thieves though. It's the sheer number of bikes that provides the opportunity. Among the thousands you can always spot expensive bikes with flimsy locks, lashed to moveable/breakable objects, locked to themselves or even left unlocked altogether. But the thieves aren't picky either. Until recently my commuting bike was a cheap Mongoose hybrid and someone tried to bash my lock for it in the middle of the day in the middle of campus. All they got was a gouge out of the lock but that was the last time I left a bike outside and out of sight at school. Now I keep my bike in my office and apartment, I try to hang out at places where I can keep it with me, and when I have to leave it outside and out of sight I cross-lock, in places with an audience if at all possible.

In the sheer audacity department, yesterday in the bikes section of Madison Craigslist someone was offering a bolt cutter for sale. Ad got flagged and deleted, but jeez.