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Upcoming test of the emergency notification system

October 14, 2024

Dear members of the Northwestern community,

We have no higher priority than your safety and security. To ensure Northwestern can quickly and effectively warn students, faculty, staff and visitors about an immediate or imminent threat on campus, the University will test its campus-wide emergency notification system (Rave) this week. Emergency messages are sent from AlertNU.

An AlertNU test message will be sent to you at 11 a.m. on Wednesday, Oct. 16, 2024, via text, email and phone. It will also be posted on Northwestern’s X (formerly Twitter) account @NorthwesternU.

It is vitally important that the University can reach you during an emergency or other serious threat. Please take a moment to verify your emergency messaging contact information in myHR or CAESAR and make relevant updates as needed. Emergency communications sent by text message are often issued the fastest. The following guides can assist you with verifying or updating your mobile number for emergency notifications via text.

You may also review these steps to log in to the emergency notification system (Rave) to validate your emergency messaging contact information uploaded from myHR or CAESAR. 

Immediate or imminent threats

In the event of an immediate threat, an urgent message titled “AlertNU” will notify members of the Northwestern community via text, email and, potentially, phone. If the emergency requires immediate action, such as an active aggressor, information will also be posted on the University’s homepage and social media channels.

AlertNU messages will be denoted with the color red, where possible. Some communications, including text messages, are limited to plain text and will not include the color red.

Emergency email messages will appear with the following header:

Crime Notice

To learn more about the procedures to keep you and others safe in emergency situations, Northwestern has developed this one-page emergency guide. In addition, to demonstrate how to respond in the event of a violent, life-threatening emergency on campus, Northwestern has produced a training video on the “Run, Hide, Fight” safety protocol.

Serious or continuing threats

For other critical incidents and potential safety threats, such as robberies, sexual assaults, aggravated assaults or vehicle thefts, you will receive email messages titled “Crime Notice,” denoted with the following purple header:

Alert NU

Please pay attention when you see these two types of alerts and follow the steps below to ensure we are all working together to secure our campus environment.

Keep your contact information current

Students, faculty and staff have their email addresses automatically entered into the emergency messaging system. 

For students, if your contact details in CAESAR contain a mobile phone number with a “Phone Type” of “Cellular,” which is also checked as “Use for Emergency Notification,” you will receive emergency messaging via text. For faculty and staff, if your contact details in myHR contain a mobile phone number with a phone “Type” of “Mobile,” you will receive emergency messaging via text. 

To review or update your contact details in CAESAR or myHR and to validate your emergency messaging contact information in Rave, please use these resources:

Encourage others to opt in

We recommend that all parents, contractors, visitors, vendors, members of the Evanston community, hospital partners in Chicago and others opt into the University emergency notification system. All can enroll in AlertNU by texting “AlertNU” to 226787. 

For more information, please visit the Emergency Notification Systems web page, which includes answers to frequently asked questions and our Glossary of Terms used in emergencies.

The security of the Northwestern community is a shared responsibility. We thank you for your partnership and vigilance in helping to keep Northwestern safe.

Sincerely,

Bruce A. Lewis
Chief of Police and Senior Associate Vice President