As recognized by the Jeanne Clery Act, emergencies on college campuses span from active shooters to bad weather to political protests. While the Clery Act is best known for requiring immediate emergency notifications, it actually goes much further by establishing a baseline for each institution’s immediate emergency response and evacuation procedures, including the use of electronic and cellular communication. With the framework of the Clery Act and modern technologies, true preparedness and the ability to quickly respond is now possible.
Responses to emergency situations on university and college campuses need to be quick and effective. To do this, institutions need to leverage advanced planning and new technology that is now easily available. Not only do universities need to be compliant, but this is also done to meet the demands to keep their campuses safe. The efficacy of these types of planning and procedures must be annually tested with the intention of ongoing improvements to your policies and technology. Advanced technologies can put valuable information at the fingertips of campus officials.
Leveraging the technology now available, each person in a campus community who needs specific actionable information can now receive it almost instantaneously. This is beyond that of the emergency text message of a decade ago that are now pervasive. Today, they are only one piece of a larger puzzle.
You can find the full article Quantum Leap in Emergency Notification Technologies for Clery Compliance and learn more about more advancements in safety through technology.
S. Daniel Carter is president of Safety Advisors for Educational Campuses, LLC. Carter has served with many safety organizations and was also recognized by the House of Representatives as “the leading person in this Nation in advocating more action and tougher action against crimes that are committed on campus.” He also assisted in development and securing regulations for seven major pieces of federal legislation, including the Clery Act and the Campus SaVE Act.
