(October 1, 2008)--Two Bell County campuses are stepping up security to keep students and staff safe.
On Wednesday, the University of Mary-Hardin Baylor installed two new sirens to alert those on campus of danger, while Killeen Independent School District is putting the finishing touches on a system that can notify thousands of parents in a matter of minutes.
Last year UMHB beefed up security with a new notification system through messages and emails.
Now the campus is taking it one step further.
"Processes we had in place already requires you to be at a computer, by a telephone and if you were just walking to class, you wouldn't know there was a problem till you got into a building," UMHB Police Chief Gary Sargent said.
That seems to be a thing of the past with the addition of two new sirens to the university campus.
The sirens are set to sound in an emergency, signaling students and staff to seek shelter.
"I think it's great for the school,” UMHB Junior Kirsten Leverett said.
“I think it's great for everybody to be notified about what's going on."
In today's world emergencies could be a number of things.
A train carrying hazardous materials runs by the campus daily, campus shooters are more of a concern these days, along with severe weather.
"There's been a lot of natural disasters, like we've seen with Galveston,” UMHB Freshman Logan Mehringer said.
“If this is going to help us with tornados or anything like that, it's always good."
The Killeen ISD has brought along its own emergency notification system called Connect Ed.
Instead of making hundreds of phone calls in an emergency, the system can call send text messages or e-mails to parents, informing them immediately of what is happening.
“We can call a 1,000 parents in about 2 minutes,” KISD. School Safety Director
John Dye said.
“We can probably notify all 38,000 parents of students in KISD within just a few minutes more."
Plus the system can be used to notify parents of absences, early releases or upcoming meetings.
Killeen High School has been testing Connect Ed for the past year, come Oct. 9 the system will be up and running at all campuses.
UMHB Web Site
KISD Web Site
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