The following is a statement from University of Wisconsin Oshkosh Chancellor Richard H. Wells regarding the violence and loss of life at Virginia Tech on Dec. 8.

We share our heartfelt condolences with the campus community at Virginia Tech and the families of those who lost loved ones this week and in the tragic shootings at Virginia Tech in April 2007. The days ahead will not be easy, but, clearly, the Virginia Tech community has the support of thousands of other university communities around the nation and world.

It is also right that we express our gratitude for the hard work Virginia Tech’s leadership, faculty, staff and students undertook after the tragic shootings that took place there in 2007. In these last several years, not only has the institution integrated state-of-the-art, effective emergency alert, response and communications systems but its commitment to these upgrades has served as a model for universities like the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh.

Shortly after the tragedy at Virginia Tech in 2007, the Governor’s Task Force Report on Campus Safety highlighted UW Oshkosh’s established Students At Risk Response Team (SAART) as a best practice in addressing concerns when students struggle academically or emotionally. UW Oshkosh continues to provide training to the campus (through our “Listening Matters” initiative) to identify, assist and refer these students who may be a safety risk to themselves or others.

The courageous commitment to campus safety at Virginia Tech in the wake of the 2007 violence there further inspired UW Oshkosh to:

• Develop a new Emergency Procedures Guide in 2008, which, to this day, effectively directs faculty, staff and students with information on what to do and who to contact in situations from a severe weather warning to an active-shooter crisis on campus. The spiral-bound guide, distributed to every department on campus, is regularly updated, and its information is echoed online at www.uwosh.edu/emergency, which is part of our broader Campus Safety Resources page.
• Integrate the “Titan Alert” text messaging emergency notification system in 2009, enabling our University to send urgent messages to cell phones. Hundreds of members of our University community have signed up to receive these important alerts. Sign-up for the system is available at: www.uwosh.edu/home/titanalert.
• In fall 2009, successfully test and launch another mass communication resource: LED signboards and loudspeakers which instantly broadcast text and voice messages throughout the campus, including outdoors. The speakers are strategically placed on buildings and the signboards mounted in corridors and classrooms all around UW Oshkosh. They are also integrated with the Titan Alert system.
• Participate in an August 2010 full-scale emergency response exercise involving more than 300 participants, including representatives from University Police, Oshkosh Police Department and law enforcement and first-responder agencies throughout Winnebago County. The “active-shooter” simulation was incredibly valuable in improving communication and coordination of mass emergency response. It is one more example of a commitment that, for years, has exposed University leaders and staff to ongoing national and state training in campus emergency response.
• Develop an “Emergency” information button within our first-ever UW Oshkosh mobile application, or “app,” for smartphones. Downloaded by more than 3,000 users, the free app’s emergency sub-application provides fast phone-dialing for 911 emergency calls, for calling University Police non-emergency numbers and for requesting “Safe Walk” escorts on campus.

These campus safety improvements at UW Oshkosh have coincided with the updating and strengthening of our long-standing Campus Emergency Response Team, our Campus Emergency Plan, residence hall security procedures and earlier-developed features, such as our strategically located campus emergency communication kiosks known as “Blue Lights.”

With Virginia Tech’s leadership as a model, UW Oshkosh and other universities have also better understood the need to fortify and promote campus counseling services. During this new eruption of violence, we encourage anyone in our UW Oshkosh campus community who is feeling a need for support or assistance to contact the University Counseling Center, (920) 424-2061 or www.uwosh.edu/couns_center, or the Employee Assistance Program, (920) 424-2061 or www.uwosh.edu/eap/.  

No campus is immune to the kind of violence that has affected Virginia Tech. While UW Oshkosh has many procedures and plans in place to keep our campus safe, we understand that the promotion of campus safety is everyone’s responsibility — a shared responsibility.

By consulting and understanding the resources we have outlined above, each member of our campus community understands he or she has a role to play in making UW Oshkosh a safe learning and working environment. If you have additional questions or concerns about campus safety issues, please contact University Police (920) 424-1212 (Emergency) or (920) 424-1216 (Non-Emergency).

Again, we offer our condolences and support for the Virginia Tech University community.