Case Study 24 – Emergency Management Plan Tool for Higher Education

American University is a private coeducational Student-Faculty interactive doctoral institution with a liberal arts curriculum. American University is accredited by the Middle States Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools and recognized by the University Senate of the United Methodist Church.

The Challenge:

American University has a detailed Emergency Management and Continuity of Operations Plan that provides notification instructions and operating procedures in the event of an emergency.  Traditionally, American University has used a continuity management solution to store the Plan documents.  However, this method did not meet their needs in areas of content development/authoring, ease of maintenance, user friendliness and publishing.

The Solution:

With the need to more effectively communicate and implement emergency management procedures, American University partnered with Five Star to develop a tool that:

• Provides a more organized presentation of content and improved clarity.
• Offers better categorization of content on a more granular level.
• Provides just-in-time online fulfillment that encourages electronic delivery.
• Supports controlled, customized, and auditable distribution of content.
• Allows for keyword searches of the Plan content.

The Result:

This user-friendly tool also allows individual offices to create emergency and contingency plans specifically tailored to their individual needs while dramatically reducing the time it takes for new information to be approved and published.