A few weeks ago, we had a power outage on our campus that lasted a few days. Luckily, our dorms were quickly brought back online, leaving only our student center offline for a few days.<\/p>\n
This was troublesome in that all our student activities, athletic events, cafeterias and more were in that building. My team and I were quickly pulled in to help communicate the updates out to the campus community. Our outreach included Twitter, an alert bar on all JCU web pages and our text alert system.<\/p>\n
Students especially seemed to react most positively to the tweets. We were answering questions, posting updates and even offering treats to hungry students<\/a> (who happily took us up on the offer<\/a>.) The responses were fair, fun and engaging.<\/p>\n The reactions to our text messages were much different. I don’t know if people know that when the institution sends a text alert, and you reply, someone usually reads them. The messages back ranged from “I’m not a student here” to words I can’t even post here. Just general vitriol and anger.<\/p>\n Once the crisis was over, and power restored, I had a bit of fun on Twitter.<\/p>\n Did you know if you text back to JCU Alert, we can read those? Some of you are angry and say mean things. #sadface<\/a> pic.twitter.com\/XmTleIdrfQ<\/a><\/p>\n — John Carroll U (@JohnCarrollU) February 14, 2014<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n