Emaretta Branham
Staff Writer
In the past few weeks, FSC has experienced two lockdowns. While both threats were quickly deescalated, initiating campus lockdown procedures highlighted some confusion among the student body regarding what a lockdown actually means.
A lockdown, the top level emergency notification, is reserved for imminent danger or emergencies. In the case of a lockdown, students are to remain quiet, lock their doors and stay away from any windows.
Eric Rauch, the director of the Office of Safety and Security, agrees that it is important that students understand what the safety messages mean.
“One of the things we’ve learned from the most recent lockdowns is we are sending the messages out to you, but we really want to educate our student population as to what those messages mean,” Rauch said.
The first safety notification that students may receive is to inform them that there is police activity in the area. This means that students can expect to see lights and sirens in the vicinity. This first warning is primarily to instruct students to stay away from that area.
Rauch assures students that this message isn’t meant to incite fear.
“It has nothing to do with our campus. It could be something where a traffic stop pulled into our campus and two or three police officers are there. So I’m just letting you know that we know about it,” he said.
If the threat is escalated, campus safety will send a message informing students to shelter in place. Students should continue their normal activities but stay inside until told otherwise
This shelter-in-place notification may not be related to police activity. There are a number of things that may require students to stay inside. Rauch gave an example from a few years ago.
“We did a shelter in place on campus because they had a chlorine leak right on the other side of the railroad tracks. Well, you’re safe indoors if, you know, your air conditioner is going to take care of you. The chlorine gas is not going to hurt you in your house. So that was an instance where we used a shelter in place,” he said.
Safety’s main way of communicating with students is by email, which is sent by Rauch himself. In the case of an immediate emergency, notifications are sent via text to students’ phones. Rauch and his assistant are working to help improve communication with students in emergency situations.
There will be times when an emergency notification is sent out and students are not indoors. If this happens, Rauch recommends the “Run, Hide, and Fight” method.
If you are far away from the area of emergency, simply run. For hiding, only do it if the suspect or emergency is near you and running is not an option. Fighting is the last resort if the suspect or emergency is right in front of you.
The best thing you can do during an emergency situation is to listen to the directions given by the Office of Safety and Security or Rauch himself. The Office of Safety and Security’s main priority is to ensure that every student on campus is safe during any situation.
FSC is mandated by federal law to send out two types of messages to students in an emergency situation: timely warnings and emergency notifications.
“An emergency notification is getting an email that says, you know, a lockdown is [happening] and we’re trying to give you more information at that point,” Rauch said.
A timely warning is the message sent by Rauch and his team after the event that explains the situation and safety’s response to it as a whole.
No matter the situation, The Office of Safety and Security is always available 24 hours a day and is available seven days a week. students can feel safe knowing that the Office of Safety and Security also does a safety patrol 24/7 around campus to ensure safety on FSC’s campus.
