Utah State University has used a system called “code blue” for the last 10 years, but Judy Crockett, the university’s emergency manager, says they rarely use it.
“We do two tests a year. Last year, because of the snowstorms, we used it a couple more times, but at the very least it’s probably two times a year just because of the testing,” she said.
University of Utah Emergency Management Director Jeff Graviet says the U. follows a similar practice, and it was very effective in alerting the campus community of last week’s shooting.
“We don’t send it out very often," he said. "We want this to be an alert that people pay attention to and then take the appropriate protective actions as we update the situation.”
Both universities also use the system to send out notices of reported sexual assaults, in compliance with The Clery Act, which requires public universities to notify their students of recently reported crimes.
“Clery has certain criteria that you do have to send out, and the sexual assaults are the biggest part of that. We need to send, ‘Yes, this happened, this occurred. We may not have a whole lot of information right now but just so you’re aware and have got a heads up that this is occurring.' More information will come as it’s available and we’re able to offer some safety instructions and safety tips within that message, too.”