Spring tests are not only for students. Cornell will conduct tests of its emergency notification system this month on three consecutive Wednesdays: April 16, 23 and 30.

"These tests are part of our continued focus on development of Cornell's comprehensive emergency notification system," said Richard McDaniel, vice president for risk management and public safety. "Each test helps us refine and advance our ability to get important information to the campus community as quickly as possible during an emergency."

Cornell's four newly installed emergency alert sirens will undergo a full-scale test April 30 at 12:15 p.m. The test will consist of alert tones followed by a test voice announcement. (A sample of the alert tone can be accessed at http://www.epr.cornell.edu.) At the same time, the public address system that is part of the siren structure will broadcast a test voice announcement saying, "This is a test of the Cornell Emergency Notification System. This is only a test."

The first two tests will involve Cornell's voice and text notification systems. On April 16, all faculty and staff registered to receive emergency notifications will be sent a test emergency text message. The test will begin at approximately 12:15 p.m. Pending successful results of this small-scale test, on April 23, everyone who has registered to receive emergency notifications (some 17,000 students, faculty and staff) will receive test voice or text messages, again beginning at approximately 12:15 p.m.

E-mail reminders will be sent campuswide the day before each test. The e-mails will also urge those who have not yet signed up for emergency alerts to do.

The April tests will be the third trial of the campus text and voice message system. Changes have been made to the system since the last campuswide test was conducted Dec. 5.

"We have built more redundancy into Cornell's emergency notification system by adding a new vendor, 2 SMS, which will be used this time to send text messages for this test," McDaniel said. "AlertNow, a proven provider, will continue to distribute voice messages, which it has done very successfully in previous tests."

McDaniel observed that delays have been experienced in text messaging in previous tests and in actual alert situations due primarily to limitations of the regional communications infrastructure to accommodate this large a volume of calls. This test will use a new configuration in an attempt to improve the delivery speed of text messages.

"One of the important goals of these continued tests, in addition to improving delivery, is to determine realistic expectations for these systems," McDaniel said. "Our area is serviced by four cell phone carriers and is geographically large."

Each of the delivery methods — text messaging, voicemail, e-mail, sirens and public address — is part of a comprehensive system that is continually being examined and improved, McDaniel added.