Emergency Response

There were 10 currently enrolled student deaths during 2014-2015. The Dean works directly with the family of the student, the student’s faculty and College, and plans the University of Florida memorial service for each student- often hosted by President Fuchs. In addition to on site coordination and care, the student’s classmates, friends, and others impacted are reached out to and cared for.

If students are transported to the hospital, the emergency deans respond to the hospital 24/7 to comfort the student, share resources, meet family, and support friends. There were 192 hospitalizations during 2014-2015. The Care Team follows up with those involved to provide ongoing support.

UF’s threat assessment and management team that determines if a student, faculty, staff member or visitor is a potential threat to others or to themselves and disruptive to the environment. In those cases, a multi-disciplinary team assesses the risk and seeks to mitigate that risk. The team addressed over 1000 issues during 2014-2015.

Staff volunteer to serve on the Emergency Dean Team. Each Emergency Dean takes on-call responsibility for one week at a time 24/7 as the first tier to any student related night time or weekend emergency issue with duties including responding immediately to the hospital to be with a student until family arrives, managing on-site support for students, and working with the Dean of Students and Associate/Assistant Deans during more serious issues. A record 17 night and weekend calls came during one memorable on call week for an emergency dean this academic year.

The Dean of Students Office maintains an on-call system to assist members of the University community with emergencies. During the business day, the Emergency Dean on call may be reached at (352)392-1261. After hours and on weekends, individuals are encouraged to contact the University Police (352)392-1111 to request assistance. If it is necessary for the Dean of Students Office to be contacted at that point, UPD will make appropriate arrangements.

The Crisis Response Team is chaired by the Dean of Students and includes the Alachua County Schools, the Alachua County Crisis Center, Santa Fe College and numerous UF stakeholders to share information related to crisis/incidents on campus and in the world and to discuss and prompt university and community wide communication and response. For example, a number of deaths by suicide in the county schools had direct impact at SFC and UF due to siblings and friends attending those institutions so joint training was shared and best practices discussed.

The Protest Safety Team consists of more than 100 volunteer staff members whose role is to immediately respond to protests and marches, communicate with protest leaders, ensure safety of protestors and spectators, facilitate demands to present petitions or speak to administrators, communicate to impacted offices, and manage the protest until its conclusion. The Team works closely with UFPD, University Relations and others. At UF, between 20 and 50 protests happen on campus annually with participation ranging from 15 to 300.