Preparing for a Perfect Storm
through Cooperation
Virginia Tidewater Consortium for Higher Education: Building a Future on the Foundation of its Past with Emergency Preparedness
By Rob Minearo
Preparing for a “Perfect Storm” with a comprehensive emergency preparedness plan requires a close-up view of the building blocks that created a powerhouse cooperative endeavor like that of the Virginia Tidewater Consortium for Higher Education.
     
The building blocks that are the foundation of the Virginia Tidewater Consortium are not unlike the Virginia red brick that make up its fifteen prestigious member institutions. The building blocks were laid one by one with the hard work and dedication of the Consortium’s executive director, staff, and member presidents...(continue)


Emergency Preparedness at the
University of Connecticut
Cooperative Emergency Management at UConn
is the Strength Behind the Bells and Whistles
By Lesley Dyson
Many important developments emerged in the United States on college and university campuses in response to the events of September 11, 2001, and, seven years later, to the Virginia Tech shootings. One of the most important impacts 9/11 and Virginia Tech had on higher education was to strip away the innocence academia had taken for granted that created a safe world for students to learn, to discover, and to aspire to their greatest abilities.
     
The impact of these dreadful events also awakened colleges and universities to the imperative need to reevaluate their individual emergency preparedness plans— to grow beyond the world before 9/11, a world that is not as safe, but with the strength of ongoing emergency management, a world that will readjust to the challenges ahead, and a world that will above all continually create a safe haven for students, faculty, and staff to thrive...(continue)


Building Campus Preparedness
and Resilience
United States Academe at Risk
By Todd I. Stewart, Ph.D.
America’s colleges and universities are at risk from both natural disasters and intentional attacks that can temporarily interrupt academic operations for days or weeks or even result in permanent closure of the institution. Hurricanes Katrina, Rita and Wilma in 2005 impacted more than 30 post-secondary institutions. Now, almost 2-1/2 years after our nation’s most devastating natural disaster, many of these institutions are still struggling to regain enrollments and tuition revenue, attract replacement faculty, recover research programs, and restore or replace damaged infrastructure. It is not yet clear that all of these institutions will even survive.

Our campuses have also been the target of intentional attacks or threats of violence that have had dramatic short- and long-term traumatic impacts. Most recently, we have witnessed “active-shooter” incidents by mentally disturbed students at Virginia Tech in 2007 and Northern Illinois University in 2008...(continue)