Residence hall fire drills were considered unsatisfactory due to a lack of student response time this semester. 

“We had a mixture of times that were not up to what the city or university’s standards would be,” said Kevin Jacques, director of residence life. “We also had some people that were extremely laxed in their sense of urgency when the alarm went off. Had it been a real fire, they would have died.”

Each building is required to go through a fire drill each semester, said Vice President of Student Affairs David Shields.

“We do one for each building,” Shields said. “We do these drills with the fire department so that they can validate and time our fire drills. We’re required by law to do these drills.”

Alarms should be taken very seriously and evacuation protocol is listed on the back of each resident’s door, Jacques said.

“When the student hears the alarm, they are to put their shoes on, grab anything nearby that they need, and go down the nearest stairwell,” Jacques said. “Depending on what building they’re in, there’s a parking lot they are supposed to go to.”

Whether the alarm is for a real fire or for a fire drill, all alarms should be taken seriously, Jacques said.

“When an alarm goes off, treat it as a fire,” Jacques said. “We can’t plan fires, so we have fire drills. Sometimes the alarms go off because of smoke or something that happened in the building, but every person in the building needs to treat all alarms as a fire because it really is a life or death situation.”

Sophomore Sarah NcNeely believes students will respond better to fire drills when they know when they will be occurring, she said.

“When people don’t have any notice about fire drills, that’s when problems occur,” McNeely said. “I know they want to be spontaneous, but if you’re taking a shower or something it’s hard to respond right away.”

McNeely also thinks the university should go over the procedure better for the alarms, she said.

“The procedure is posted on the back of the doors,” McNeely said. “But at the same time, have you ever actually stopped and read it? The average person is not going to read that.”

Robert Henning, a freshman, also think more information should be given on how fire drills work, he said. 

“They should get the information out there as much as possible,” Henning said. “I know they left a note on my door explaining the procedure. That’s helpful, but I know sometimes stuff like that can get pulled off the door and thrown away.”

Drills will continue to occur in the residence halls until the response times improve, Shields said.

“We might also start doing drills at 5 or 8 o’clock at night because fires don’t happen when everyone’s awake and ready to go,” Shields said. “Fires happen when people are sleeping, the buildings are partially open, or people might be cooking or doing other things.”

Students who do not respond to fire drills could be subject to disciplinary action, he said.

“Another thing important to know is not leaving a building during a fire drill or tampering with fire equipment is a referral to the university’s code of conduct,” Shields said. “It’s a violation. You could be suspended from the university or no longer allowed to live in the residence halls.”

Repeating the drills will probably help, Henning said.

“I’m sure it will bring the times down,” Henning said. “I’m sure students will not be happy about having fire drills nearly every week, but it’s for our safety. We should get over the fact of how much it sucks.”