Miami, Sept. 26, 2016– Miami Dade College (MDC) will be observing National Campus Awareness Month and National Preparedness Month in September with this year’s theme of Connecting and Engaging. The observance coincides with the launch of MDC LiveSafe, a free college-wide mobile app for students and employees to enhance public safety on campus.
From Sept. 26- 30, each campus will host its own daily demonstrations and visual displays pertaining to safety and preparedness. MDC’s Public Safety departments will host several events that are open to the public. Activities will include training, handouts, demonstrations, and briefings. Topics include identity theft, trauma & injury prevention, suicide prevention, sexual assault awareness, texting & driving (traffic safety) and several emergency preparedness presentations.
The week-long initiative will include partnerships with several governmental entities such as the Miami-Dade Health Department, Miami-Dade Police Department DUI Educational, and many more.
With the launch of the LiveSafe app, users will be able to report emergencies and safety tips to MDC’s Public Safety departments, which will alert the dispatch call center. Users can call 911, or call or text the campus public safety department directly from the app. The app will also prompt students to the appropriate campus once within the campus’s geo-map area.
Users will also receive notifications from the MDC’s alert system and, in case of an emergency, the programmers can geofence an area and request for all users within it to identify whether they’re safe. Helpful information at all eight MDC campuses, such as locations of blue light phones, buildings and parking garages, will also be available under the Safety Map option of the LiveSafe app.
The app is available in the App Store and Google Play for free to students, parents, faculty, and staff of MDC.
For more information about these activities, contact Public Safety. A list of phone numbers for each Public Safety office can be found at www.mdc.edu/main/safety/.
For more information about the LiveSafe App, contact Yakir Fernandez, MDC director of emergency preparedness, 305-237-3774.