The University of Colorado at Boulder will test the Campus Alerts text-messaging system on Oct. 30 at noon.
The Campus Alerts system had 14,278 subscribers as of Oct. 27 including students, faculty and staff members. About 38 percent of the campus community is currently enrolled.
"Over 14,000 members of our community have been proactive and have taken the time to sign up so that they can receive an emergency alert. That's a good start but we would like to see even higher participation," said Chancellor G.P. "Bud" Peterson. "Campus Alerts will take just minutes to notify the campus community in the event of a major emergency."
Â鶹ÒùÔº, faculty and staff can sign up to receive an alert by a text message, e-mail, or both. Campus community members with a colorado.edu, cu.edu, or cufund.org e-mail address can sign up for the system at .
Volunteers with laptops will be available in the University Memorial Center on Oct. 30 from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. to help students, faculty and staff sign up for the system.
After they receive the test message, users are encouraged to add CU Alert to their phone contacts so in the case of an emergency the alert will display as received from the university.
Users who have changed phone numbers or switched carriers since signing up should log in to the system to update their contact information. They can log in through CUConnect or by going to . Answers to frequently asked questions and support information also is available on the site.
Any user who expected to receive an alert and didn't, or who needs help signing up for the system, should call the IT Service Center at 303-735-HELP or e-mail help@colorado.edu.
The Campus Alerts system was launched in the fall of 2007 following a task force recommendation to add a text-messaging alert system to CU-Boulder's other emergency communication tools. The system allows the CU-Boulder administration to send messages of 132 characters or less to cell phones in the database, and messages are received within several minutes of the transmission. Messages can be updated and used to direct people to appropriate Web sites and TV and radio stations for information. Alerts also can be sent by e-mail.
In an emergency, users would be directed to the CU Web site at , to the CUConnect portal at and to the campus Information Line at 303-492-INFO or 303-735-INFO for additional information.
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