By Cassidy Peterson
Staff writer
Email: [email protected]
The Dragon Alert app is now available for Hutchinson Community College students to download on their mobile devices.
It has features like Friend Walk, which allows you to share your location with a friend in your contacts to make sure you get somewhere safely. It also has a section that takes you to all of the emergency plans that HutchCC has from a fire to a chemical spill.
Social Escape is another special feature on this app, all you do is type in your phone number and tell the app when to call you and you can then pretend to be on the phone with someone for as long as you need to to get out of a situation you do not want to be in. Other aspects include a campus map, safety toolbox, emergency contacts and support resources.
Dana Hinshaw, Executive Director of Student Affairs and Campus Safety, says HutchCC decided to update their notification system after multiple issues with the current notification system. The primary factor that led to the change was the confusion that took place on Feb. 12, when there was a bomb threat and notifications were not received in a timely manner to most students.
In April, HutchCC decided to switch over to Rave Alert, to create the DragonAlert Emergency Notification System. Rave Alert is used by many organizations, including other colleges. All students are opted into the DragonAlert Emergency Notification System automatically.
While this system was being developed, there was an option to add an app through App Armor, which is an organization that works closely with Rave Alert.
“It had some interesting and useful functionality that our committee thought could be useful to our students and faculty,” Hinshaw said.
The app was released in August after beta testing this summer. The next step, Hinshaw said, is adding a resource that will contact a safety officer to help students air up a flat tire or figure out what to do if they have locked themselves out of their car.
“We hope that our students and staff are happy with (Dragon Alert). It’s all about keeping people as safe and informed as they can be if there is an emergency or weather alert,” Hinshaw said. “This app is just one more part of campus safety and keeping our campuses as safe as possible.”
After hearing about the app Buhler junior Brooklyn Canfield says the app sounds like a good idea and great for campus safety.
“I would definitely consider getting it,” Canfield said.
The DragonAlert app has a red icon with the HutchCC dragon logo on the front, the app is free to use and can be found anywhere you download apps.
