Disaster Recovery Planning and Pandemic

Over the past three years, significant progress has been made toward increasing the University of Minnesota's overall emergency response capabilities through the revision of our Emergency Operations Plan under the leadership of the Department of Emergency Management and the Emergency Management Policy Committee. As part of that process, new systems have been established for responding to public health emergencies, such as incidents of bioterrorism or infectious disease outbreaks, on campus. The Academic Health Center, through the Office of Emergency Response, has taken a lead role in this area of preparedness planning and response on campus and is also working aggressively with local and state public health partners to explore and prepare for our potential role as responders in a larger local, state, or national emergency.

"Students arriving on campus this semester are getting a new task added to their to-do lists: Log onto "Who I Am" and provide emergency contact information.

The new service is the latest upgrade to Cornell's ongoing emergency planning effort. Since the late 1990s, well before 9/11 and recent U.S. campus shootings, Cornell has had a team of officials and responders dedicated to planning for events most people don't want to think about."

Many campuses are exploring how information technologies might play a critical role, when disaster strikes, in ensuring the continuity of their most essential business, educating students. This panel will explore how Web-based services can be used to minimize the impact on instruction of a significant shutdown of the physical campus. Not all disasters have the same uniform impact; this panel will emphasize how to plan the process, from course preparation to delivery, for pandemics like Avian Flu.

This EDUCAUSE Review web bonus includes an interview with Brian Voss, the CIO at LSU.