Issue date: 3/7/08 Section: Campus News

A text message from the University.

Last Thursday at 11:52 a.m., Vice President of Administration and Chief Risk Officer Walter Hunter stood outside his University Hall office and watched students across the Main Green reach into their pockets and pull out their cell phones. Hunter had sent them a message.

Just before noon, 7,000 Brown students and faculty received Hunter's text, reminding them about the test of the emergency alert system siren, though Hunter said the mass text messaging was meant to test the message system more than to alert students of the siren.

Though he said the University had given students and faculty "plenty of advanced notice," about the siren, they wanted to test the speed and effectiveness of the MIR3, Inc. e-mail, text, voice and fax alert system.

Hunter and a colleague received the texts four minutes after activating the system.

Over 3,500 students, or 60 percent of undergraduates, provided their cell phone numbers to the University earlier this year. The first request the University sent out asked students to mark one of three choices indicating whether they would provide their numbers, declined to give them or did not have a cell phone.

Graduate students, medical students, faculty and staff were also included, though fewer graduate and medical students provided their numbers, Hunter said.

But even if the University could contact only one-third of the student body, the word would spread rapidly, Hunter said.

The text message system will not be used for spamming but only for "important, time-sensitive matters or essential systems tests," he said.

Some instances include "crime alerts where the situation is active" and major impending weather events, Hunter said. As far as weather is concerned, something at the level of a snow storm would not warrant a text message, but rather an e-mail, while a tornado would warrant use of the siren.

Text messages would be employed more frequently than the siren but much less frequently than e-mail alerts, Hunter said.

Though some students may hesitate to give their numbers for privacy reasons, Hunter said the University would not "be releasing these cell phone numbers to anybody unless for an official purpose."

After the system test last Thursday, the University sent out another e-mail to all students who had not provided their numbers urging them to do so, Hunter said.

Continued...

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