Emergency Notification Systems and Crisis Communication – Blog

In the COVID-19 world, there is a lot of misinformation and confusion about how to safely reopen organizations, campuses, and schools. The reality is there is no magic bullet for contact tracing programs. Contact tracing requires self reporting and HIPAA compliance for data privacy. For those reasons, our focus remains on providing safety officers, campus police, and school administrators with comprehensive, credible resources and suggestions for best practices to help inform decision-making in preventing the spread of infectious diseases, saving lives, and protecting people.

Omnilert recently partnered with Campus Safety Magazine on the webinar, “Severe Weather Preparedness: Educating Students, Staff and Faculty on Proper Responses,” featuring meteorologist Dr. Kevin Kloesel from the University of Oklahoma. The webinar raised questions about weather safety practices on university campuses and highlighted how administrators can fulfill their duty of care to ensure the safety of students and visitors. Preparedness for severe weather requires foresight, planning, education, and demands improvement on campuses.

We recently partnered with Campus Safety Magazine on a webinar entitled, “Post-Columbine: Top Lessons Learned About Active Killer Situations,” featuring a presentation from Chief Stephen Lopez of the New Mexico State University Police Department. The webinar examined our changing responses to the threat of active shooters on campuses and aimed to explain the evolution of law enforcement practices, education safety procedures, and community responsibility since the Columbine tragedy in 1999. The ensuing nationwide discussion on campus safety and security led to a host of reforms and changes in practice to keep students and communities safe today and into the future. 

Dr. Anthony Fauci is an American physician and immunologist who has served as the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) since 1984.  As a physician with the National Institutes of Health (NIH), Dr. Fauci has served American public health in various capacities for over 50 years, and has been an advisor to every U.S. president since Ronald Reagan.  Since January 2020, he has been one of the lead members of the Trump Administration's White House Coronavirus Task Force addressing the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States.  

Bob Jensen led the U.S. government’s crisis communications efforts after the massive earthquake in Haiti, the Deepwater Horizon oil spill response, Hurricane Sandy and over 30 other major U.S. disasters. He served as a spokesperson for the White House National Security Council, as well as the U.S. Embassy Baghdad, and deployed on four combat zone tours to Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Afghanistan.

How do you console a graduating senior who will likely have to postpone commencement?  How do you temper the anxiety of a teacher who has to shift all lesson plans online? These are probably some of the most difficult messages for institutions to draft and communicate, but perhaps the most valuable of them all is what you say to keep your campus community safe.