Dickinson administration announced in a Jan. 22 email that the college’s Emergency Response Team will hold a lockdown drill in “early February,” on a date undisclosed to The Dickinsonian.

“During this drill we will be testing the capabilities of the college’s emergency communication system (Red Alert) as well as the community’s awareness of appropriate shelter-in-place and barricading techniques,” said Dee Danser, assistant vice president of Compliance and Campus Safety and chief of Public Safety (DPS). 

Campus will be alerted of the drill with two Red Alert messages. The first will announce that the drill is about to begin and another message will follow officially beginning the drill. It will last around 30 minutes, and Dickinson will issue an “all-clear message” signaling the end of the drill, according to the email.

External card entry access to all campus buildings will be shut off by the Department of Public Safety. Doors to rooms requiring card access inside buildings will still be in use. DPS instructs students who are outside to hide or leave campus if safe to do so, and students who are inside to shelter in the nearest classroom or office, lock and barricade the doors, and move to the safest part of the room. More detailed instructions are laid out in a campus-wide Jan. 29 email.

Danser said, “There will be no role-playing involving actors portraying intruders, no real or simulated use of weapons and no auditory or visual stimuli other than notification to your phone and/or email through the Red Alert system.”

“I want to make sure our community members know how to protect themselves in the event of something we hope never occurs, such as an armed or violent intruder on campus,” said President Margee Ensign in an email to The Dickinsonian. “This drill will provide an opportunity to practice those important skills.”

“I asked out Emergency Response Team to plan a lockdown drill. We all work very hard to make sure this community is as safe as possible, and being prepared is an important part of keeping students, faculty and staff safe,” said Ensign. 

In an email sent on Monday, Vice President for Finance and Administration Brontè Burleigh-Jones said 312 doorstops would be issued for use on campus doors that do not have locking mechanisms. “In the coming months, the finance & administration team will be working to create a prioritization plan for the installation of standardized locks throughout the campus,” said Burleigh-Jones.

“The installation of a campus-standard interior locking mechanism for classrooms, offices and meeting spaces will likely be a multiyear, phased project,” said Burleigh-Jones. “A door stop is unlikely to completely secure a door, and it should not be the sole basis of your response to a security event.”

All first-years were required to watch active intruder training videos earlier in the year, though “the school could have made [them] a lot better,” said Matt Schaller ’22. “They were very overdramatic when they could have been more informative,” he said. Elizabeth Ensslin ’22 said she thought the videos were out-of-date. “A lot has definitely changed,” she said.

“My main problem is that we were not given the information in a timely manner to allow students to whom this might be potentially triggering or damaging to be away from campus or to opt out of it,” said Shannon Nolan ’19. 

“Based on the way that fire drills and blackouts go, I’m not sure this will garner that much response,” said Nolan. 

“Unfortunately, drills like this are necessary because of the state of our current society,” said Erin Lowe ’22, a first-year class senator. “I am worried about getting caught outside in these low temperatures and locked out, but I understand the importance of such an exercise. We just have to hope that our only exposure to lockdowns is in the form of a drill.”

“I think it’s an important drill but I hope we never have to put any of the things we’ve learned into practice,” agreed Samuel Eck ’22.

“I think it is good to be prepared for emergencies,” added Paul Wakefield ’20.

Elizabeth Haraburda ’19 said given that information about the lockdown is being communicated over email, “a lot of people probably don’t even know what to do unless they’re being super proactive.” 

For more information on how to prepare for an active shooter incident please visit the Emergency Preparedness page of the Dickinson website.