June 23, 2010

To the University Community:

In 1992 when Hurricane Andrew devastated much of southern Miami-Dade County, it also taught us a hard lesson about hurricane preparedness. Disasters are often unforeseeable, but our responses to them shouldn’t be.

In the aftermath of the storm, we tried contacting students, faculty, and staff to make sure everyone was safe and to advise them of the University’s business continuation plans.

With communications severely disrupted, we discovered that our contact records were outdated or incomplete—many people had moved, changed phone numbers, or been displaced by the storm and hadn’t provided emergency contact information. What should have taken a day or two to accomplish took a great deal more time and effort and left too many people unaware of what was happening at the University.

Given the campus-wide communication systems we now have, we can remain in effective contact with all of you, as long as we have the proper and updated information.

If you haven’t already done so, please take a few minutes to make sure your contact information is up to date at myUM at www.miami.edu/myUM.

Three key pieces of information include:

• Cell phone number (Remember to check the box to allow UM to send text messages to your cell phone.)

• Out-of-town contact person

• Storm address if you cannot stay in your home afterwards

And after a storm, please check in at our Recover website at recover.miami.edu, which is designed for data collection and reporting. Students, faculty, and staff will be able to provide contact and location information at that site post-storm that can be used in case recovery efforts are necessary.

Help us be well prepared to remain in effective contact with you in case of a disaster. Log into myUM at www.miami.edu/myUM, and make sure all your contact information is current.