Students, staff and visitors are encouraged to notify Campus Safety of any emergency or potentially dangerous situation. Upon receipt of such information, Campus Safety will access available sources of information to confirm the existence of the emergency and will be responsible for initiating the College's response and for marshaling the appropriate local emergency response authorities for assistance. Depending on the nature of the information received, other College departments may be involved in the confirmation process.
In the event that Campus Safety or other campus officials confirm there is an emergency or dangerous situation that poses an immediate threat to the health or safety of students or employees, Campus Safety will be responsible for initiating any needed emergency notifications to the campus. The Director of Campus Safety, in consultation with senior staff, will assess the nature of the situation and determine (1) the appropriate segment or segments of the College community to be notified, and (2) the most appropriate content to be disseminated to the Knox community.
This emergency notification process, which may include some or all of the systems described above in the Timely Warning section, may also include the use of personal and mobile public address devices, as well as the Knox Alert system, which has the capability to issue multiple voice, text, and email notifications simultaneously to landline and cellular telephones and email accounts. Such notifications will be issued without delay unless they will, in the judgment of the first responders (Campus Safety, Galesburg Police Department, Galesburg Fire Department and/or Galesburg Hospitals' Ambulance Service) compromise the efforts to assist a victim or to contain, respond to, or otherwise mitigate the emergency.
After the initial notification, follow-up information will normally be provided on the Knox College website. During the emergency, the College website home page will contain information that deals with the emergency circumstance and will be updated throughout the event. In addition, if deemed necessary, the Director of Campus Safety or designee will notify local law enforcement of the emergency if they are not already aware of it and local media outlets so that the larger community outside the campus will be aware of the emergency.
It should be noted that, unlike the Timely Warning requirements, emergency alerts are not limited to Clery reportable crimes. Any incident which may pose an immediate threat to the campus would be considered for the use of this protocol.
