Augustana College Gets “Ready to Respond” to Active Shooters

1,700 students, 150 staff, and 34 local agencies, organizations, and public safety departments respond to full-scale active shooter exercise
 

During the past year, the students, faculty, and professional staff of Augustana College participated in multiple preparedness initiatives, including a scenario for its annual full-scale exercise on April 26, 2016. The scenario simulated a Town Hall meeting by a high-profile, controversial political figure in the campus auditorium involving an angry protester opening fire.  Last year, 100 students took part in the exercise, and this year, due to a successful outreach campaign to the campus Greek organizations, the exercise attracted 1,200 students whom practiced sheltering in place, while 500 other students actively participated as mock victims. With assistance from approximately 100 members of the Augustana College professional staff, students immediately sought shelter and went into lockdown.

 

Deputy Chief of Public Safety/Police and Campus Emergency Planning Director Mark Beckwith collaborated with 34 local agencies, organizations, and public safety departments from the campus and surrounding communities in the Quad Cities area, including Rock Island and Moline, IL, and Davenport and Bettendorf, IA.

Campus Staff, Law Enforcement, and EMS Practice their Responses

As the mock shooter fired blanks that echoed throughout the auditorium, the students received an alert on the Augustana E2Campus app advising them to go into lockdown. At the same time, several individuals used the piloted Campus GUARD911 emergency notification app to alert local law enforcement. Law enforcement officials register with HERO911, another app, to receive notifications from incidents reported on GUARD911. In one minute, more than 20 police officers on and off duty responded to the report with their HERO911 app.

Officers from law enforcement agencies in the Quad Cities area and emergency medical services responded to treat the injured.

“The exercise helped our campus to further our collaboration with local law enforcement and emergency management in active shooter planning, preparedness and response,” said Beckwith. “By using today’s technology, such as the GUARD911 and HERO911 apps, our campus community was promptly notified along with the rapid response from the metro area law enforcement agencies responders arrived on the scene quickly and efficiently.”

Augustana College is the only private college and one of four colleges to receive recognition by the Illinois Emergency Management Agency as a Ready to Respond Campus. The college has also been recognized by the National Weather Service as a StormReady® University.