College Alert Notifications For Emergencies and Announcements

Colleges alert notification services are widely usedthrough text messaging. However, in a recent
by higher education institutions to inform students,article entitled, "Text Messaging as Emergency
parents, faculty and other constituencies ofCommunications Superstar, Nt so gr8," Dewitt
important announcements and updates.Latimer, the CTO at Notre Dame, said, "Although
While most people think that these services andSMS (text) message delivery is usually rapid,
systems are put in place for emergency uses,receipt time and actual delivery can't be
the technology is actually more often used forguaranteed. A recent study found that 91 percent
other purposes such as phoning alumni, orof SMS messages were delivered in less than five
contacting students during the admission process.minutes, but the same study determined that
Colleges interested in improving communicationsapproximately 5.1 percent of messages were not
have a choice to make in how they set up theirdelivered at all. In short, the SMS infrastructure
system. They can install an inhouse system orwas never intended to be used for real-time
they can hire an outside vendor who provides themass notification in emergency situations; it was
service. Generally speaking, outsourcing thedesigned as a unicast messaging system to
service is much less expensive and faster tosupport low-volume, one-on-one communications."
implement for several reasons, including the factWhile colleges should use a variety of overlapping
that installing, maintaining, and paying formethods to reach its constituents in emergency
hardware, software and telephone lines is be verysituations, It is apparent that cellular carriers, as an
costly, especially for something that wouldn't beexample, prioritize regular voice traffic over text
used everyday. On the other hand, an outsidemessaging. That being the case, a college's best
provider already has the infrastructure in placebet for first line notifications would be to phone
and colleges can access and activate it anytime,broadcast recorded messages, then back those
from any location that has web access. Moreover,up with texts, emails and even old fashioned PA
colleges can use the service on a pay as you go(public announcement) speakers.
basis. There are no upfront costs or outlays andIn non-emergency applications which are used
if the service is not used, there is no cost.much more often, such as phoning alumni about
The other advantage to outsourcing an alertevents, or school applicants about deadlines, phone
service is that it would have a much greaterbroadcasting is the ideal method. You just set up
capacity to distribute alerts quickly because of thean account with an outside vendor at no cost,
number of phone lines that can be accessed. Anthen upload your phone list to your online account
internal system may only have a handful of linesand record your message over the phone. You
that can be used to dial out, versus a servicesimply choose your phone list, pair it with your
bureau which probably has hundreds of thousandsvoice message, and press send. And instantly,
of lines. In theory, if you have a 30 secondthousands of messages are delivered. It is the
recorded voice alert message, a service bureaufastest, easiest and least expensive way to
that 1000 lines, could deliver 2000 messages atarget and reach your contacts.
minute. (Of course, that does not take intoIn summary, outsourcing a phone broadcasting
account how many rings it would take forservice that can deliver voice messages over the
someone to answer their phone, or how long itphone is probably that best way to begin building
would take for their voicemail to pick up for youan effective college alert notification system that
to leave a recorded message.)will inform contacts of important news quickly and
At first glance, many colleges believe that theefficiently.
best way to communicate with students is