Campus to use new alert system

Starting next month, UCLA will launch a new emergency alert system utilizing text messaging and outdoor speakers in order to disseminate information and give students instructions in case of an emergency.

The text-messaging system, dubbed “BruinAlert,” will start out as open to students only with faculty and staff able to sign up at a later date and will cost the university about $132,000 per year, said Jack Powazek, the assistant vice chancellor of general services.

All of the text messages the university sends out will be priority, meaning they will arrive before any other texts a student might be receiving, which would be important in an emergency situation, he said.

Powazek said the goal of the system was to alert all students within 15 minutes of sending the message, and a priority message – which would cost the university 8 cents per text – is the best way to do that.

An example of an event that would cause the university to use this system is an active shooter situation, such as what happened at Virginia Tech, but more likely would be the instance of an earthquake, he said.

Both Powazek and Lawrence Lokman, the assistant vice chancellor of communications, stressed that any emergency notification system would only be used to alert students in the event of a campus-wide safety issue.

“The impetus of this system ... is that we now have a better tool to communicate with,” Powazek said. “But that still leaves the issue of when to use it and how to use it – it’s very situational.”

Starting the first quarter of 2008, the university will also be installing three outdoor speakers with a range of 500-800 feet that can be used to notify three areas of the campus in the dorms, the Intramural Field and Royce Quad.

The areas covered, however, are only a small fraction of the campus. Powazek said that in the future they hope to cover all of UCLA with the system.

The cost of the speakers is about $50,000 each and is being split among several different departments on campus.

Gabe Rose, the Undergraduate Students Association Council president, said he was glad to see a well thought-out and comprehensive plan from the university – especially one that includes text messaging.

“I’m pleased to see a lot of work has been done on this,” he said. “But to my knowledge, students were not involved in the process.”

Rose also said he would like to see as many students sign up as possible.

“My office would be more than happy to lead the sign-up effort from the student side,” he said.

The university will be notifying students several different ways, including via advertising, sending letters home to parents and sending out an e-mail about the new system.

UCLA will also be randomly selecting one student per week who signs up to receive $75 on the their BruinCard as an extra incentive.

The company providing the service, AtHoc, has also done similar systems for large companies such as Boeing and eBay successfully for several years, Powazek said.

The new system is still only one aspect of a larger system that has been in place at UCLA for some time, which also includes an emergency call-in line, the UCLA Web site, an emergency radio station, an emergency broadcast and others.