April 30, 2008— Butler University in Indianapolis has selected Honeywell’s Instant Alert Plus notification service to quickly provide details and direction to students, faculty and staff during emergencies.
The service allows administrators to broadcast voice or text messages to any communication device—phone, cell phone, e-mail, pager or PDA—which will help the university connect with people on and off the 290-acre campus, and improve response times for emergency personnel, says Honeywell. It will augment other efforts like sending e-mails and voicemails, posting messages on the university Web site and providing information through the local media.
Instant Alert Plus can send up to 150,000 30-second phone calls and 125,000 text messages in 15 minutes. The service also allows the university to send customized messages to specific groups, such as emergency responders or residents of a particular dormitory. And it provides real-time, Web-based reports that show who has or has not received a particular alert.
In addition, Butler University can poll and get feedback from students, faculty and staff with the service’s two-way communication function. Other features include the ability to automatically bridge message recipients into a conference call, and send attachments with text-based messages to provide more detailed information and instructions.
Created for municipalities, colleges and universities, businesses, and healthcare and industrial facilities, Instant Alert Plus is an extension of Instant Alert for Schools, a notification service that helps K-12 school districts improve communication and emergency preparedness. More than 2,300 schools nationwide use Instant Alert to connect with parents and guardians.
For more information visit the Honeywell Web site.
