The university on Feb. 25 will test a new live emergency alert system together with the current Send Word Now system to study the possibility of switching platforms.
In a Feb. 16 e−mail informing the community of the two tests and requesting that individuals update their contact information, John King, senior director of public safety, said that the university is "evaluating new technology to explore alternatives and compare to our current platform."
The Tufts Emergency Alert System, which was first implemented in November 2007 following the Virginia Tech shootings, has been using the Send Word Now platform to disseminate information to the community via phone calls, e−mail and text message.
The university tests the alert system every semester and during the upcoming test will simultaneously conduct a trial of a new platform, Rave Mobile Safety.
Geoffrey Bartlett, technical services manager in the Department of Public Safety, said officials will do benchmarking on the Feb. 25 to compare the performance of the two systems. This information will aid in the process of determining which alert system is more effective for the university.
He explained that the technological advances that have taken place since university officials chose Send World Now during the vendor selection process in the summer of 2007 was the motivation behind testing a new platform.
"Although the system works … there's also been a lot of change in the industry over the course of the time," Bartlett said. "We thought it was appropriate to go out into the marketplace and look at the technology that has emerged and look at the vendors we considered then to see how they've changed and see how the different technology compares to what we're using now"
Dawn Irish, the University Information Technology (UIT) director of communications and organizational effectiveness, said that many other universities have switched to using Rave Mobile Safety, prompting Tufts to consider doing the same.
"A lot of other universities have recently chosen this [platform], so we thought it would be worth giving it a look and testing it in our environment," she said. "We just want to make sure that the technology we're using is still competitive with the other technology out in the marketplace."
Irish echoed Bartlett in noting that Send Word Now has not yet posed any problems for Tufts. "It's been a really solid technology and we've been happy with the performance," she said.
The specific nature of the differences between the two systems cannot be known until after the test is run, according to Irish.
"All of the different groups out there do something slightly different in terms of the way they deliver messages," she said.
Bartlett said that a lot of factors will influence the eventual decision on the vendor for the alert system, which will involve a standard request−for−proposals process.
"We look at the vendor's architecture, references from other users, features you don't see like how we control the system," he said. "We look at all these factors before we can make any decisions about what's best."
Irish also highlighted issues like contracting and data privacy as other considerations.
One of the factors that, at least in the initial stages, will not be affecting the evaluation of the two systems is the relative cost.
"One of the things we did initially is that those of us who are involved in the use of the system and technical analysis have been shielded from the cost of the different vendors," Bartlett said. "A few of us on the team are just doing technical analysis without being biased by knowing the costs of the different vendors."
Bartlett emphasized, however, that ensuring the safety of the community went beyond having the right technology in place.
"Here at Tufts we've got an emergency system that we believe is an excellent system," he said. "But in addition to that, we've got procedures and training that we feel [are] as important as the technology and that we think prepares us well to use that system to keep the community informed."
Bartlett stressed the need for individuals to do their part to keep themselves protected.
"Prepared individuals are going to lead to a prepared institution," he said. "Everybody, in addition to those of us in the industry, should be cognizant of their own preparedness … sign up for emergency notifications, keep your contact information up to date and do what emergency messages say."
It is also important for individuals to share any information that they receive in the event of a notification, according to Bartlett.
"Even with technology, there are reasons information won't get to everyone," he said. "Not everyone signs up or has access to their phone, so we continue to underscore that word of mouth is part of our strategy."
Irish said that Tufts' priority is to ensure the safety of its community. "We want to make sure whatever we're using is the best," she said.
