KCTCS Implements InformaCast for Campus Emergency Notification

Brad Parkel — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 15:56:08 +0000

Kentucky Community and Technical College System (KCTCS) Implements a Singlewire InformaCast Solution as part of a Statewide Emergency Notification System.

Read Written Version | Watch Additional Video Interview Footage

DR. JAY BOX: Kentucky Community and Technical College System was formed back in 1998. Today we have grown to sixteen comprehensive community and technical colleges with 67 campuses across the state of Kentucky. BOB HAMMONDS: There are no dorms at any of our campuses. We do not have dormitories. So, all of our students commute. Several of our students due to the nature of their colleges and remote locations travel up to an hour, an hour and a half each way to attend class on a daily basis. Five years ago is about the time we started our, our overall crisis management process. The culmination of this process has been the implementation of a emergency notification system. DERREL CONE: We have the ability with our Voice Over IP phone to hit a services button and it brings up a menu and we can choose the message. This is a pre created, pre recorded, pre scripted message and we can choose that message right there by hitting a button. And then we can choose what group we want to send it to. This campus, or that campus, or all of our campuses. We have the ability right then and there to send that message. So, if it's a critical message and seconds count, we can make it happen. Snap is the name we've given our emergency notification system here at KCTCS. The system goes immediately to about 8,000 or so Voice Over IP phones. It can go to desktop computers. And also we're tied into a text messaging which gets out thousands of messages in minutes. InformaCast does what we consider internal messaging. It sends to the internal phone, the internal PA's, the internal IP speakers, the desktops on our campus. SchoolMessager is our external component. It sends out SMS tags to anybody who have signed up for the SMS tags. It sends out the emails to anybody who signed up for the emails. Well when you send out an infomaCast message, we have the script. And then what that message does is goes out, logs in to the school messenger, runs a pre created job with SchoolMessengerand then does what we asked it for. We can hit that one button and then it does it all. BOB HAMMONDS: It's something that's used much more frequent than we anticipated. We knew we had emergencies and we knew things went on. But since we've implemented the system it has been phenomenal. DR. JAY BOX: We have several testimonials from our students talking about what a great concept this has been. They love the idea of the quick notification. Plus from the safety prospective it's, it's that feeling more secure. That when an incident does happen, we have a process now in place that can notify our employers and our students in case of that emergency. BOB HAMMONDS: One person's life is worth much, much, much more than what we've invested in this system. The comfort that it gives a person in my role as being Director of Crisis Management for this system is I know we can't prevent things from happening. But I feel comfortable at night knowing that if something happens tomorrow we're going to be able to alert people, let them know what's going on and potentially save lives. And for me the cost is . . . the benefits far out weighs any cost we have incurred.

The Challenge

Culmination of comprehensive crisis management planning involved the need for a stable emergency notification system that could access multiple locations quickly and provide continuity in the notification process

The Solution

Implementation of InformaCast paging software that, in conjunction with the Desktop Notification System, and SchoolMessenger, allows contact across campuses through IP phones and speakers, legacy paging systems, computer desktops, SMS text messaging,and email

The Benefits

Cross-campus, “one-click” notification for speed and consistency of messages
Control over who can access and send messages, integrated with Active Directory
Easily scalable to diverse environments
Able to broadcast to different technologies, including overhead IP speakers, IP phones, desktops, legacy paging systems, and (with SchoolMessenger) email

Read and Watch additional information on this case study.

Transcript from Video

BOB HAMMONDS: There are no dorms at any of our campuses.
We do not have dormitories.
So, all of our students commute.
Several of our students due to the nature of their colleges and remote locations travel up to an hour, an hour and a half each way to attend class on a daily basis.
Five years ago is about the time we started our, our overall crisis management process.
The culmination of this process has been the implementation of a emergency notification system.

DERREL CONE: We have the ability with our Voice Over IP phone to hit a services button and it brings up a menu and we can choose the message.
This is a pre created, pre recorded, pre scripted message and we can choose that message right there by hitting a button.
And then we can choose what group we want to send it to.
This campus, or that campus, or all of our campuses.
We have the ability right then and there to send that message.
So, if it’s a critical message and seconds count, we can make it happen.

Snap is the name we’ve given our emergency notification system here at KCTCS.
The system goes immediately to about 8,000 or so Voice Over IP phones.
It can go to desktop computers.
And also we’re tied into a text messaging which gets out thousands of messages in minutes.

InformaCast does what we consider internal messaging.
It sends to the internal phone, the internal PA’s, the internal IP speakers, the desktops on our campus.
SchoolMessager is our external component.
It sends out SMS tags to anybody who have signed up for the SMS tags.
It sends out the emails to anybody who signed up for the emails.
Well when you send out an infomaCast message, we have the script.
And then what that message does is goes out, logs in to the school messenger, runs a pre created job with SchoolMessengerand then does what we asked it for.
We can hit that one button and then it does it all.

BOB HAMMONDS: It’s something that’s used much more frequent than we anticipated.
We knew we had emergencies and we knew things went on.
But since we’ve implemented the system it has been phenomenal.

DR. JAY BOX: We have several testimonials from our students talking about what a great concept this has been.
They love the idea of the quick notification.
Plus from the safety prospective it’s, it’s that feeling more secure.
That when an incident does happen, we have a process now in place that can notify our employers and our students in case of that emergency.

BOB HAMMONDS: One person’s life is worth much, much, much more than what we’ve invested in this system.
The comfort that it gives a person in my role as being Director of Crisis Management for this system is I know we can’t prevent things from happening.
But I feel comfortable at night knowing that if something happens tomorrow we’re going to be able to alert people, let them know what’s going on and potentially save lives.
And for me the cost is . . . the benefits far out weighs any cost we have incurred.

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KCTCS Implements InformaCast for Campus Emergency Notification