Text-based Warning Notification System is Currently Available
Since the tragic shootings that unfolded almost a year ago at Virginia Tech and the more recent events at Illinois State University, a major question has been renewed in the minds of the faculty and campus police of universities across the nation: How do we effectively protect our students from disasters on campus?
That job is currently of primary focus for the University of South Alabama’s police department, who is approaching new methods of contacting not only the faculty and staff at USA about emergencies and disasters but also alerting the very people they are sworn to protect-the students.
The original warning system that has been in place for years is called W.A.R.N., Wide Area Rapid Notification system, which is a service based in Virginia that works with universities to send out text messages, pages, e-mails and phone messages to faculty and staff in event of an emergency or disaster on campus.
Initially, the W.A.R.N. system was employed only for weather-related occurrences, in which faculty and staff at South Alabama were alerted, and it was up to them to relay the warning message to the students.
“This system was implemented by Dr. Adams, former vice president of student affairs, but after so many occurrences of university shootings, we needed to expand our modes and rapidity of outreach to students during disasters of any variety,” said Norman Gamache, USA’s chief of police.
One role of W.A.R.N. that is expanding is the range of contacts and mediums of which to alert not just faculty and staff but students as well.
“Students can go onto their PAWS account and type in their phone number with the area code and be automatically registered on the campus database to be texted with a warning in the event of a disaster,”
Gamache said. “We also are applying this to all 103 buildings on campus with phone lines, where they will receive an automated warning call in place of a text message.”
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The text-message warning system has been in place currently for about four or five months, and the first time it was tested there was a slight software glitch on the administrative side. It has been corrected, and the system is now confirmed to be working properly and seamlessly.
Another development in campus warning that the University is presently developing is connecting a cable network to all televisions on campus.
In the case of a disaster, a warning would flash at the bottom of the television screen describing the disaster and what necessary precautions to execute.
This type of notification would be similar to the scrolling notifications given by the National Weather Service on the major local channels.
The most apparent notification system in the works is a voice-over siren system, in which a siren on campus is activated, similar to the tornado sirens, and then an automated verbal notification of the emergency will be communicated immediately after.
“This ensures that if some students may have not checked their e-mail or phone for the emergency at hand, they will most likely hear the on-campus siren to warn them,” Gamache said. “This system would be the most direct warning for students on campus, with an almost immediate effect.”
In case of an emergency in the middle of the night, the dorms and The Grove apartment complex would not only have the siren alert activated, but notification door to door would be exercised to further inform students.
In the event of an emergency or disaster, all of these methods would simultaneously be employed, ensuring that every student is notified in one way or another. A major concern of the University is the time it takes for students to receive campus-wide messages.
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