OUR VIEWS Consensus Opinion

The administration is launching a new notification system, to be used to alert students of on-campus emergencies. The system will use a combination of emails, voice and text messages and sirens to quickly warn the campus about severe weather alerts and other threats to students' safety.

While the system's development began some time ago, the Virginia Tech tragedy last April highlighted the need for an effective mechanism to make everyone aware of potentially dangerous situations. As such, it's good to see the administration move from planning to implementation so quickly.

The system appears to be well designed, with the emphasis on optional but highly recommended text message notifications, to be rolled out in September. The option has already proven popular, with 78 percent of the students who have signed up for the system opting to receive the messages. The average college student always carries a cell phone, and using these for emergency notifications makes a great deal of sense.

Likewise, the requirement to register in the emergency notification system before accessing the password management system in the Passport service ensures all students register within a few months.

As the rollout of the system progresses, however, we hope the administration keeps a few critical things in mind.

First and foremost, in order for the system to be effective the campus community must have a clear understanding of how the system works and what circumstances it will be used under. New students should be taught about the system in their GT1000 classes, while returning students could learn through public forums and comprehensive documents.

To further ensure everyone is aware of the system's operation, the campus should undergo a realistic security drill that will show everyone how the system works in practice.

After these drills, however, the system should be used only in the most severe emergency cases. The fastest way to make the system useless is to make the alerts common enough to be ignored, much like fire alarms in campus housing (a severe problem in its own right). Even a single false alert could undermine the effectiveness of the notifications, as students would begin to hesitate before taking action in response to the warnings.

If the rest of the system's implementation is as effective as we hope it will be, it will allow each student to feel confident that he or she will be made aware of any significant incidents that take place on campus, and that service goes a long way towards addressing everyone's safety concerns.