Western Kentucky University creates workplace violence & safety online brochure

By Burton Speakman, The Daily News

A brochure has been created as part of the continued effort to ensure faculty, staff and students at Western Kentucky University know what to do during emergencies.

Faculty and staff will begin receiving the handbooks this week. They contain color-coded tabs indicating certain problems such as medical emergencies, tornadoes, earthquakes and criminal activities. It includes numbers to call and tips on what to do. It includes a list of questions to ask someone who is calling in a bomb threat.

The police department wanted the document to be a quick reference, said Capt. Mike Dowell, spokesman for the Western Kentucky University Police Department. It was designed to focus on incidents that might occur around the campus.

The idea for the handbook came from Western’s emergency management committee, he said.

“We want to be able to provide faculty and staff with information so that they will be able to guide themselves and students to safety,” Dowell said.

The brochure offers information on how to react to anything from workplace violence to a flu outbreak on the campus, he said.

The police department did a great job putting the brochure together, said Elizabeth Greaney, director of health services at Western, which paid for the printing costs.

Officials wanted the brochure to be easy to use, she said.

“What really struck me about the document is that very colorful and easy to sift through,” Greaney said.

The goal was to have the brochure sitting by every phone at Western, she said.

“We didn’t want the brochure to be cumbersome. We wanted people to be able to find information quickly,” Dowell said.

Most important is the brochure can be updated at any time, Greaney said.

“We’re looking for feedback from our users, and that will be included in our next edition,” she said.

“I envision this as a document that we update and revise every couple of years,” Dowell said.

The report is available online at the Western police Website.