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eBookCritical event kit for higher education safety: Hurricanes

Registration portal

• Ensure your registration portal is prominently placed on your university’s intranet for easy access by faculty, staff, and students. Given the diverse usage of intranet tools, visibility is key to encouraging registrations.

• Enable options for subscribing to non-emergency alerts, enhancing user engagement and expanding the opt-in subscriber base.

• Mandate the inclusion of primary and secondary contact information to enhance notification reach during critical events.

Hurricane system checklist for higher education institutions The checklist outlines crucial steps that emergency managers can take to ensure their emergency notification system is ready when needed.

Key asset

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eBookCritical event kit for higher education safety: Hurricanes

Weather alerts

• Implement automated weather alerts tailored to the specific region of your campus to keep the community informed of potential risks.

• Prioritize the dissemination of high severity weather alerts to all stakeholders to address life-safety concerns promptly.

• Offer the option for users to set do not disturb periods, with provisions for overriding during critical life-safety events.

Multi-lingual registration and notifications

• Ensure multilingual support for your registration portal to cater to the diverse language preferences of international students, faculty and staff.

• Provide users the flexibility to choose their preferred language for receiving messages, ensuring effective communication and understanding.

Pre-scripted templates

• Utilize pre-scripted message templates to expedite communication during emergencies, enabling quick dissemination of accurate information.

• Allow customization of key details within pre-scripted messages to ensure relevance and precision in alerts.

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eBookCritical event kit for higher education safety: Hurricanes

Settings

• Encourage the adoption of an institution-owned mobile app for push notifications and receipt acknowledgment.

• Ensure clear identification of caller ID for emergency calls to optimize response rates.

• Provide confirmation mechanisms for message receipt to enhance communication reliability.

• Implement effective notification throttling mechanisms to prevent system overload.

Contact data

• Regularly update faculty, staff, and student contact information to reflect changes in personnel or residency.

• Conduct periodic data tests to validate contact details, remove duplicates, and maintain data integrity.

GIS capabilities

• Incorporate evacuation zones into your system for efficient communication during evacuation procedures.

• Integrate surge zones to notify individuals in areas prone to heightened risks during emergencies.

• Include critical infrastructure sites within notification zones to ensure timely alerts in case of compromise.