Inside the Department of Emergency Management

Over the last six years, the Department of Emergency Management (DEM) has helped guide Cal Poly through wildfires, landslides, storms and a global pandemic.

During such emergencies, the DEM team activates and leads the Emergency Operations Center (EOC), a strategic team of employees from divisions and departments across campus to coordinate the university’s response and create emergency recommendations.

Behind the collaborative coordination system that is the EOC and all of the recommendations, frameworks and rapid responses to these events, is a team with decades of experience working to train and prepare the campus for all potential emergencies.

This is DEM.

Established in 2016 as a sector of Public Safety, DEM works to develop and maintain a sustainable campus-wide emergency management program. The department is organized into functional groups consisting of the management, planning and training and exercise teams along with the readiness and logistics team.

Its mission is to support students, faculty and staff in improving the campus’s capability to prepare, respond, recover and mitigate potential hazards. Of nearly equal importance, DEM also works on business continuity planning, helping different sectors of campus figure out how to continue working during and post emergencies.

Through their preparedness services, they help campus community members identify possible hazards, understand protocol when facing danger, learn how to make emergency kits and create plans for an unexpected crisis. To further mitigate a problem, DEM provides training to anyone on response.

As the leading emergency management group, DEM creates effective and resourceful plans for handling dangerous situations efficiently. Planning is an analytical process that evaluates hazards and the different associated complexities. DEM takes a ground-up approach, looking at the task, categorizing it, evaluating establishment, what a possible program entails, operating procedures and resources to enact.

DEM also assists with student volunteer organizations, such as the Red Cross Club and Veterinarian Emergency Response Team., They also offer first-line emergency response personnel action for the university, which coordinates response actions.
In any emergency, it’s vital to stay updated. DEM offers options to keep individuals informed, like Poly Alert, an emergency notification system that delivers critical information to ensure safety. Poly Alert keeps the campus community in the loop for hazard warnings, emergency instructions, evacuation messages and other related information. Emergency messages are distributed through Poly Alert by text, email and voice. All Cal Poly emails are automatically enrolled in the service.

With a collaborative mentality, DEM partners with leaders across campus in every department. This coordination also involves response groups DEM manages, like the Building Emergency Response Coordinator Program, consisting of assigned staff in every building trained to assist with emergencies.

The DEM team is always looking at ways to help the campus become more prepared. At the moment, DEM is introducing a Duty Officer program that will provide the campus with an emergency manager assessing potential hazards 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

In the future, DEM plans to address growth in the campus community and expand protocols as the campus population grows. In addition, they hope to create a community-based emergency response team, working with community members by training them to be proactive responders in dangerous situations.

To learn more about DEM, visit their webpage. You can also email them at dem@calpoly.edu for any questions.