Registration for the campus-wide safety alert text messaging system WiscAlert-Text began Thursday and will be available to all students through the My UW server.
Events like the shootings at Virginia Tech and Northern Illinois University and the homicide of UW-Madison junior Brittany Zimmermann prompted university officials to create the new method of communicating to students across campus.
The new form of communication at UW-Madison will be used to alert students in cases of emergency when using text messaging proves to be more efficient than other alert systems.
“The police department would evaluate the situation and determine whether we need to make the community aware of the situation through text, email voicemail, reverse 911, the WiscAlert website or WiscAlert on Facebook,” Lt. Michael Newton of the University of Wisconsin Police Department said.
The text message system will not take the place of these other alert forms but rather work with them to improve the flow of communication between the law and students, staff and faculty.
“All of the systems work in conjunction with one another. Different situations bring up different modes of communication,” Newton said.
Several hundred students have already registered and the Wisconsin Police Department strongly encourages students, faculty and staff of UW-Madison to register for this alert system.
WiscAlerts-Text does not charge registered users, but cell-phone companies will apply normal text charges.
According to Newton, an extraordinarily high number of registered users could cause an initial delay in the system.
“If all 90,000 eligible people register for this system, it will take a while to send the messages through the system,” Newton said.
Students can register their cell phone numbers through the WiscAlerts-Text portal on their My UW accounts.
“One of the main things we are looking forward to is SOAR and getting incoming freshmen to sign up,” UW spokesperson John Lucas said.
The University Wisconsin Police Department hopes to attain the majority of registers by the fall 2008 semester.
