UW–Madison enhances crisis communications

Editor’s note: This is the first in an occasional series of stories about how the UW–Madison community is reacting to the tragedy at Virginia Tech.

At UW–Madison, as everywhere, timely and effective internal and external communications are critical to the campus response to a crisis situation.

Since April, representatives of the University Police Department (UWPD), the Division of Information Technology, University Communications, University Housing and the Offices of the Dean of Students have met regularly to enhance the university’s crisis communications capabilities.

The efforts are augmenting plans that have been in use for many years. The university constantly updates and trains on plans designed to provide resources and coordination with responders and information to the community at large.

If UW–Madison were to face a shooting, chemical spill or natural disaster, the key concept is redundancy, according to the group participants.

“Unfortunately, there is no one magic communication system that we can press a button and let everyone know what is going on,” says Capt. Johnnie Diamante of the planning and development department of UWPD.

As a result, UW–Madison plans call for a single set of clear information to be distributed by numerous methods, such as mass e-mail, news releases, postings on the My UW Portal, “instant” crisis Web sites and other tools, broadcast voice mail or 1-800 numbers.

In addition to broadcast text messaging, one other new tool is expected to come online soon. A system called Reverse 911 would allow UWPD and Dane County to make numerous simultaneous calls to campus phone lines to help warn about a dangerous situation. More details about new systems are expected in the near future.

Beyond distributing messages, an even greater challenge is getting 60,000 busy students, faculty and staff to pay attention to critical information across a widely dispersed geographical area.

“We’ll try to pick the right tools for the situation and respond as quickly as we can,” says Diamante. “Information can be posted or distributed within minutes. However, even with the quickest distribution, there’s no way to ensure people will listen.”