Winter storms test limits of emergency response system

While winter storms played havoc with weather conditions and class schedules, they also gave Texas A&M University-Commerce the chance to test its emergency response system. The university has a complex structure in place for situations that require closing the university and, according to A&M-Commerce officials, the response went with only a few minor glitches.

"I know there's been some discussions at high levels in the university about what worked and what didn't work, and IRIS continues to shine through as being a reliable method," Crime Information Officer Jason Bone said. "Nothing beats the direct phone call."

One of the issues encountered was the lack of communication between A&M-Commerce campuses. While the president or acting president determines whether or not to close the A&M-Commerce campus, the heads of the other campuses make the call to close their campuses.

"We have a lot of campuses other than Commerce, and it has been a real challenge to become integrated with other campuses," Bone said. "If you are an A&M-Commerce student and you take classes in Navarro, but you don't take classes with them also, you're on their campus but you're not in their system. You wouldn't get their alerts. What we started doing the last few days [of the inclement weather] is that if Collin College sends out an alert, we re-broadcast that to our students that attend Collin College."

While students may only receive the phone calls or read the message on the website, the system in place to determine whether or not to close the university is complex, as is the way the university disseminates that information to students, faculty, staff and the surrounding media.

"The crisis team, headed by [Safety Manager] Derek Preas, has a crisis room with a giant computer screen that has a live feed from the National Weather Service," Assistant Vice President of Marketing Communications Randy Jolly said.

Once the situation gets to a critical point, Preas calls University Police Department Chief Donna Spinato, who makes a recommendation to the president.

"At that point, the president or the acting president makes a determination," Jolly said. "The satellite campuses are dependent on whoever owns that campus. After the president makes his decision, Chief Spinato calls me and I immediately call the web manager, who puts a notice on the website. Then I call the GM of KETR, who updates the KETR website, starts broadcasting it on KETR and updates the weather hotline."

Jolly then communicates with some of his staff, who are tasked to call local radio and television stations with the information. After that, he communicates with the A&M System.

"Then I write an email to System Communications so they know that we will be closed," he said. "The whole process from when I get the call from Spinato to when the media is alerted is usually between five and 10 minutes. While we're doing that, UPD is handling the IRIS alert system."

When determining whether to close the campus or not, the president has quite a few factors to consider.

"So much of our student body, faculty and staff is off-campus, so we have a lot of driving over from Dallas, Rockwall, Mesquite, etc.," Jolly said. "The other day it was bright sunshine, but we still canceled because the roads west of here were covered in ice. The call for the president is 'what is safe for our students.'"

There are some misconceptions surrounding the result of closing the campus.

"My office has received a number of inquiries as to whether or not canceled class days would have to be made up," President Dr. Dan Jones said in an email to faculty, staff and students. "The short answer is no: unlike public schools, universities are not required by law to meet a minimum number of days per term."

The university did have faculty come on campus even when it was closed.

"We had some problems where some of the faculty didn't understand that when we close the campus, the buildings are closed, and you can't come up and work on something," Jolly said. "Those buildings are closed for a reason, for liability reasons."