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Affordable New Emergency Alert System Fills Higher Ed Market Gap, Saves Tens of Thousands of Dollars for Smaller Campuses
January 11, 2008
ARLINGTON, TEXAS -- January 11, 2008 -- For the past eight months, smaller colleges and universities nationwide have been searching for campus-wide text-messaging notification systems that they can afford, to keep their students and staff safe in the event of a Virginia Tech-like crisis. With the release of School System Alert (http://www.SSAlert.com), higher education institutions with smaller budgets now have access to school alert systems that can save lives. "The core technology for mass text alerts has been available for years," says Matthew Lee, President and CEO of NetStrategies & Management Inc. of Arlington, Texas, and creator of School System Alert, a web-based system that enables administrators to affordably communicate with thousands of students, faculty and employees within minutes. "It doesn't have to cost $300,000 or more per year. Our service delivers the same functionality as more expensive systems, without attempting to capitalize on a climate of fear." Like the more expensive systems, School System Alert uses SMS/text messaging Ernie Plowman, Dean of Students for the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, says they looked into a number of providers. "SSAlert was the only offering with significantly more affordable, yet comparable services." Rick Rice, director of risk management for Dallas Theological Seminary (DTS), agrees. "We are a small school, so we try to be good stewards and get the best deal we can." Rice points out that SSAlert is not just for emergencies. "Some of our DTS students travel long distances to campus only to find out that school is closed. We will use SSAlert to announce school closings in advance of inclement weather." "No advertising gets sent through the SSAlert notification system, so that students are likely to stay opted in for the alerts instead of opting out to avoid spam," adds Matthew Lee. NetStrategies & Management (http://www.netsam.com) has been in business since 1996, specializing in custom web applications and systems. For more information about School System Alert, go to http://www.ssalert.com or call toll free 1-866-455-3841.
technology to broadcast alerts to the cell phone, PDA or computer of thousands of recipients. Its network includes multiple redundancies so that in the case of power or hardware failure, messages still get through.
Associated Multimedia
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