By Quincy San, March 25, 2025
Cal Poly Pomona performs an evacuation drill each semester to test the preparedness of its faculty, students and response systems.
This year’s drill took place Tuesday, March 18, at 11:45 a.m. During the drill, building occupants were evacuated outdoors as fire alarms sounded off in the background. The aim of the drills is to have members of the CPP community practice their own preparedness and situational awareness in cases of emergency.
As part of the university’s response system and emergency procedures, messages were sent out to all students, staff and faculty members through various means. Those using school-owned devices such as computers received a pop-up message on their screens that alerted the users about the drill. Messages were also sent via texts, phone calls and voicemails, as well as to student email inboxes.
When the drill ended at noon, CPP community members received messages through the same means, notifying them about the end of the drill.
Arlett Carmona, the Office of Emergency Management manager at CPP, said her office works with the Department of Strategic Communications and the University Police Department to provide a week and a day prior notice about the drill.
Having one drill per semester also gives incoming transfer students the opportunity to participate in the drill and familiarize themselves with the process so they do not have to wait for an upcoming semester.
“There’s no such thing as a perfect evacuation drill,” Carmona said. “By their very nature, it is a practice for something that is completely uncontrollable. If there is any inconsistency or incongruity or something that needs to change in our procedures, this is when we want to find it out instead of during an actual emergency.”
Carmona said she believes the ideal evacuation drill would include everybody participating in it and treating it as a real-life event to benefit the most from the evacuation drill.
Computer science student John Li said he felt the university did well in notifying students about the evacuation drill ahead of time.
“I thought the school did a good job letting us know it was going to be happening,” said Li. “I received text messages as well as phone calls regarding the event, so I did what I was told and evacuated.”
Li said he liked CPP’s proactiveness throughout each stage of the evacuation drill.
“There were posters and signs in buildings the week before the drill even took place,” Li said. “There were texts being sent out, and there were calls being made when it started, as well as when it ended.”
Li said he believes the student community as a whole benefitted from the evacuation drill, adding that it trained students on what they should be doing if something were to go wrong. He said he knew what to do and where to go, and he was not worried about being in an unsafe position during the entirety of the drill.
However, not all students felt the same. Some students felt that the drill was rushed and did not change how they felt about emergency preparedness.
Edgar Tinjaca, a criminology student, said he felt the drill was not as effective as it should have been in preparing students for an emergency.
“I do not feel like they did a good job of notifying beforehand,” said Tinjaca. “I wouldn’t have known about it if I didn’t work at the BRIC, as there was a sign when you walk in saying it was happening.”
Tinjaca also said he believes a more interactive or well-thought-out drill would be better at preparing students for emergencies.
“I feel like I was already prepared for an actual emergency and didn’t need any practice,” he said. “I know if an emergency is happening, I’m getting the heck out of there.”
Despite how Tinjaca viewed the evacuation drill, he said it has the potential to be beneficial if changed in the future. According to Tinjaca, if the university made some tweaks to the drill, it could benefit students who are newcomers to the university and those who are not as familiar with the campus.
Carmona strongly urges CPP students to keep their contact information updated through their BroncoDirect portal. By having the latest information saved, the university is able to contact its students in real time during emergencies and keep them updated.
To stay informed and learn about future updates, visit the Office of Emergency Management‘ s website.
Featured image courtesy of Quincy San
