Bryn Mawr, PA-[EMERGENCY NOTIFICATION NEWS]-- August 30, 2007 - Over the summer, Bryn Mawr implemented a new emergency communication system to provide immediate information to students, faculty, staff, parents and other interested parties in the event of any campus emergency. The College has purchased a system called e2Campus to provide electronic communications in any of several formats, including telephone text messaging, e-mail and RSS feeds.
Registration (at http://www.brynmawr.edu/emergency/e2Campus.shtml) is free and takes only a few minutes. If you plan to register for mobile-phone text messages, you should have your phone with you when you register; the service will send you a confirmation number that is required to complete the form.
Any emergency message sent through e2Campus will appear on the Bryn Mawr Web site's gateway pages for current students, faculty, staff and parents; the system will be used to communicate information about weather and transportation as well as emergencies. The College has also purchased a siren that can be used to notify community members of emergencies.
Phone Registration and E-mail Forwarding for Students
According to Chief Operations Officer Jerry Berenson, communicating with students has become more difficult as they have embraced cell phones rather than the College's phone system. For the first time this year, the College will not assign dorm-room telephones unless students request them. The College strongly urges all students who use cell phones to register them with the College to ensure that the College can communicate both routine and urgent information to them. To register a telephone number, visit http://virtual.brynmawr.edu and follow the steps below:
Under "Self-Service," click on "Student Center" and then click the link to the Biographical Update Form.
Update your preferred contact phone number (may be a mobile phone number) and emergency contact information. Be sure to indicate which phone number should be included in the campus directory: dorm or mobile phone. If you choose to register a dorm phone, you must visit Telephone Services to activate your room phone.
Berenson notes that e-mail is also used for many important communications from the College. He recommends that students who prefer an outside e-mail service to their Bryn Mawr accounts have their Bryn Mawr e-mail forwarded. To initiate e-mail forwarding, go to http://www.brynmawr.edu/computing/docs/e-mailforward.shtml.
Source: Bryn Mawr Press Release
e2Campus System in Place at Bryn Mawr College
Northern Arizona University NAU improves emergency notification system
NAU today announced a new emergency text notification system that sends urgent text messages to students, faculty, staff and even family members. NAU is partnering with Omnilert, LLC. and using its service e2Campus to create NAU Alert, a mass notification system to send text messages to cell phones in case of an emergency, including weather-related closures. The service is free and voluntary, but users must register to receive NAU Alert. They also can add an additional phone number as well, so that a family member or friend receives notification of an emergency. "NAU prides itself on its great safety record, and we are doing all we can to keep it that way," Fowler said. Currently NAU uses computer pop-ups, e-mail, web pages and the NAU Now Line (928-523-0007) to inform individuals of weather alerts or other emergencies. The university also works with local media to spread messages. "NAU Alert is a great new tool we can use to get critical message sent out to students, parents, staff and faculty" said Fred Estrella, NAU chief information technology officer. "It will be another method we use to communicate effectively during an emergency situation." Only emergency or other urgent messages will be sent via NAU Alert, and the system will not be used to distribute advertising or other unsolicited content. Though the system is free, subscribers may have to pay fees associated with their text messaging service. Source:
Flagstaff, Ariz. --[EMERGENCY NOTIFICATION NEWS]-- August 30, 2007 - Students at Northern Arizona University (NAU) and their families have a new and fast way to learn about campus emergencies.
"The public safety partnership here at Northern Arizona University between the students, faculty, staff and the NAUPD will benefit tremendously from the improved communication created by the NAU Alert program," said NAU Police Department Chief GT Fowler. 
Thomas Bauer
NAU Office of Public Affairs
(928) 523-6126
Thomas.Bauer@nau.edu
University of Southern California Launches Roam Secure Alert Network for Emergency Notification (RSAN)
Text Alerting System Showcased on NBC Nightly News
Arlington, VA --[EMERGENCY NOTIFICATION NEWS]-- August 28, 2007 - Roam Secure, Inc. today, announced that the University of Southern California (USC) has deployed the Roam Secure Alert Network (RSAN™). TrojansAlert (https://trojansalert.usc.edu) enables campus public safety and university officials, to send targeted alerts to its 33,000 students and more than 17,000 faculty and staff. Parents of USC students can also sign up for the system.
USC’s main campus is located in downtown Los Angeles. The university also has a health sciences campus located east of downtown, plus facilities in Marina Del Rey, Orange County, Sacramento, Washington, D.C., Santa Catalina Island, and Alhambra. With RSAN the entire campus, or targeted areas both on and off campus can be notified. The system is capable of reaching most text-enabled device including: cell phones, pagers, e-mail, Blackberry, instant messaging as well as voice calls via landline and cellular phones and fax. RSAN integrates with other communication media including indoor and outdoor speakers and AM radio station. The system also provides two-way messaging capabilities. All messages are stored and presented in the web-based application via the AlertTracker or to the field via a mobile device, creating an alert summary and audit trail.
Roam Secure supports more than 135 RSAN systems across the country at major cities, counties, states and federal government agencies, schools, hospitals, airports, refineries and other key businesses for routine and emergency communication. The Roam Secure Information Exchange (RSIX) enables the University of Southern California to automatically and securely connect with other RSAN systems in six major metropolitan areas, including the Northern California Regional Terrorism Threat Assessment Center (NC RTTAC) and the three county system in San Francisco, San Mateo and Marin. USC’s system can also share information with other RSAN systems across the country in Louisiana, Mississippi, Florida, Virginia, Maryland, District of Columbia, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Colorado via RSIX. Each new RSAN system, including existing systems throughout California, can join the growing national emergency information exchange and share private and public all hazards emergency information regionally, statewide and nationally at no additional charge.
“USC joins a growing number of Universities across the country deploying RSAN and RSIX. USC has deployed a text-based, fully interoperable emergency alert system that serves the students, faculty, parents, and campus security at USC,” said David Drescher, CEO of Roam Secure. “They have further enhanced their communication capabilities and are better prepared to communicate with their constituents quickly, on all types of devices, and share information with other colleges and government agencies across the country.”
NBC Nightly News showcased the USC alert system along with Washington, DC and Roam Secure. Watch the video at http://www.roamsecure.net/pressitem.php?news_id=189.
Source: Vendor Press Release
U of I Announces Hawk Alert Emergency Notification System
IOWA, IOWA CITY -- [EMERGENCY NOTIFICATION NEWS] -- Aug. 28, 2007 - University of Iowa administrators will soon be able to send emergency voice and text messages to students, faculty and staff within minutes, thanks to a new emergency notification system, called "Hawk Alert." University administrators are urging all students, staff and faculty to add or update their cell and other phone numbers in the university's database as soon as possible.
The first phase of the Hawk Alert System will include voice calls and e-mail, and will be implemented by Sept. 1. By Nov. 1, the second phase will add text messages for those with text messaging capabilities, such as text-message-enabled cell phones.
"The recent bomb scare on the UI Pentacrest illustrates the need for such a notification system," says Steve Parrott, UI spokesperson.
"Even though we had a mass e-mail prepared within a few minutes of learning that there might be bombs on campus, it took too long for the e-mails to be delivered, and many people are away from their e-mail for extended periods. This new system promises to send messages within minutes to thousands of phones and text-message devices at once," Parrott says.
"The new service gives the university the ability to contact students, faculty and staff in the event of an emergency, using a variety of methods," Parrott says. "Once students and employees add or update their cell and other phone numbers, they can rest assured that we will do our best to contact them at the numbers provided if there is an emergency situation."
"Except for testing, our intention is to use the Hawk Alert System only in the event of an emergency," Parrott says, "and personal cell phone numbers provided specifically for the emergency system will not be used for other purposes, nor will they be listed in any public directories." Detailed instructions on how to provide emergency numbers are available at http://hawkalert.uiowa.edu.
The service being used by the Hawk Alert system is Connect-ED®, developed by The NTI Group, Inc., of Sherman Oaks, California specifically for schools, colleges and universities.
"The University is also investing in a series of notification towers equipped with sirens and voice alert systems that also will help ensure that those on campus hear alerts and warnings," Parrott says. "We hope to have these towers up and working in the next few months."
"A test call will be made in early September to ensure that each individual successfully receives the message. Test calls will be made as infrequently as possible," Parrott says. "We don't want anything, especially annoyance with unwanted calls, to prevent people from providing their numbers for this important function."
SOURCE: University of Iowa News Services, 300 Plaza Centre One, Suite 371, Iowa City, Iowa 52242-2500
MIR3 Announces Completion of TelAlert Acquisition - Industry Consolidation Continues
Integrated Company Now Single Source for Strategic Enterprise-Wide IT and Business Continuity Intelligent Notifications
SAN DIEGO, CA --[EMERGENCY NOTIFICATION NEWS]-- August 27, 2007 - MIR3™, the technology leader in Intelligent Notification (IN®) solutions for global enterprises, today announced the completion of its acquisition of the TelAlert software business unit of CalAmp Corporation (NASDAQ:CAMP), a leading provider of wireless products, systems and services headquartered in Oxnard, California.
CalAmp previously announced that the transaction was valued at approximately $10M in cash, a note and preferred stock in privately-held MIR3. For many years TelAlert has been the industry leader in wireless notification for IT, providing enterprise customers with the communications infrastructure to meet critical service-levels.
TelAlert integrates with major IT infrastructure management applications including HP OpenView, HP ServiceCenter, BMC Remedy and Tivoli®; databases such as Oracle® and Sybase®; and system architectures from IBM®, Hewlett-Packard, Sun®, Microsoft® and Red Hat®. Thousands of companies, including 80 of the Fortune 100 U.S. companies and a growing number of global companies in Europe, Asia and Latin America, have deployed TelAlert’s software solutions.
Amir Moussavian, MIR3 president and CEO, said, "The acquisition of TelAlert creates the only global enterprise notification platform and allows us to provide superior market solutions based on leading IT and business continuity/disaster recovery (BC/DR) notification technology. Through our extended suite of products and services, MIR3 is now positioned as a single-vendor source for all aspects of strategic enterprise-wide IT, BC/DR and supply chain management notifications.” Moussavian added, “TelAlert’s existing customers should rest assured that MIR3 is committed to providing the best product and customer support in the industry without interruption while preserving our customers’ investments in integration of their current TelAlert solutions with their IT enterprise systems.”
MIR3’s OEM and channel partners now have access to a richer, more scalable solutions portfolio that spans the realm of intelligent enterprise communications and includes hosted, installed and mobile solutions. MIR3 is committed to maintaining and sustaining all of the business and technical resources needed to support TelAlert and MIR3 customers and partners.
New Customer Appreciation Pricing Program Announced
In conjunction with the acquisition, MIR3 is rolling out the Customer Appreciation Pricing (CAP) program, designed to make it easy for TelAlert’s users to upgrade to TelAlert 6e. CAP is a unique, limited-time offer that gives customers full credit for every dollar they spent on their most recent TelAlert Messaging Server software purchases toward the purchase of a new TelAlert 6e configuration. TelAlert 6e is specifically designed as an enterprise messaging system that provides a fully integrated and assured communication channel by making use of existing corporate portals, databases and business applications. Built on top of the market-leading messaging engine, the TelAlert 6e SOA platform extends the service beyond IT and network management usage to include the global enterprise. To take advantage of the CAP offer, customers must commit to the upgrade by October 30, 2007. Customers may phone 1-510-903-4072 or email sales@telalert.com for CAP program details; or visit www.telalert.com/CAP.
“For the long term, customer relationships are unquestionably more important to us than an individual sale,” Moussavian said. “We’re determined to provide the best ongoing support to loyal TelAlert customers. The CAP offering signals our intention to be a vested partner in their success.”
Source: Vendor Press Release