But that move created some major problems for the Roanoke, Va., college.
Campus staff didn't run the energy management system. That control resided in Richmond, three and a half hours away.
From Richmond, people remotely accessed the system and accidentally set off the siren.
"They actually put our college in lockdown three or four times by mistake, and needless to say, that didn't go over very well," said David Harrison, director of information and educational technologies for the community college.
The college needed a way to control the siren locally. So less than a year ago, Virginia Western Community College installed a new emergency system that prevented accidental lockdowns and automated the emergency notification process.
In 2007, the Virginia Tech Massacre of 32 people hit close to home for the community college. And like other universities and colleges around the country, Virginia Western amped up its emergency preparedness efforts.
But the emergency system it installed recently is different from the ones at other colleges.
"I think that's probably one of the most unique implementations in the country," Harrison said.
Throughout campus classrooms and hallways, the college installed more than 30 blue pull stations labeled "lockdown." They look similar to red pull stations for fire alarms. When anyone sees something suspicious, that person can pull down the lever.
Automatically the sirens go off. Campus police receive a text message with the pull station location. Every VW Alert subscriber receives a text message alert., and the system broadcasts lockdown messages to college phones in every office and classroom.
With the emergency system, called the Situational Awareness Response Assistant, the college tried to come up with something creative. The IT team used a technology that monitors door opening and closing, built it into the emergency system and added it to the automated lockdown.
Since installing the new system, the college hasn't had any more false alarms. And no one has accidentally pulled the lever down.
"If we did have somebody pull them down, the system actually even provides the location of the station that was pulled so campus police would know exactly where the emergency was," Harrison said.
Because the college takes its emergency procedures so seriously, it tests the entire system once a month.
Soon, the college will start using the system to monitor backup generators in each building. In case of a power outage, the system would automatically alert support staff. And eventually, the college would like to bring the fire panels in every building onto the emergency alert system.
