Marshall University completes an emergency alert test at the beginning of every semester to bring awareness to MU Alert.
Jon Cutler, Marshall chief information security officer, said the alert test also makes sure all subscribers’ contact information is up-to-date so they can be reached in case of a campus emergency.
MU Alert is a free service provided by the university through Blackboard Connect. Blackboard Connect is a service from the company used for MUOnline that sends out mass notifications.
Marshall uses this service to keep students, faculty and staff in the know in case of any type of unusual occurrence including inclement weather, illness outbreak, a campus safety threat and other emergency situations.
Cutler said he considered the procedure to be a success.
“In terms of speeds and feeds, we had 12,343 people subscribed at the time of the test,” Cutler said. “Of those subscribers, 12,226 were reached, so about 99 percent.”
Though the test was said to be successful, Cutler’s office uses a diagnostic to see why the other 1 percent was unable to be reached.
Cutler said the internal reports point to invalid phone numbers or email addresses.
“Just because one contact point didn’t reach, doesn’t mean all didn’t reach,” Cutler said.
Statistics from the test show 80 to 85 percent of subscribers are students. The remaining 15 to 20 percent are faculty and staff.
In case an emergency did took place in which students and university employees would need to know immediately, Cutler said once the information is typed out and sent, it should arrive in less than two minutes.
Students, faculty and staff can update their contact information or subscribe at MyMU.
Tyler Ferris can be contacted at [email protected].