By Victoria Durgin, Editor in Chief
A new mobile app intended to provide students a platform through which they can report unsafe behavior on campus is now available for download.
The LiveSafe app was officially unveiled on Friday afternoon in an email from Susan Lantz, the vice president for Student Life. More details were provided in an email from Jennifer Servedio, Susquehanna’s chief information officer and via a YouTube video.
“If we utilize LiveSafe, and follow the health and safety procedures both on campus and off, we’re sure to have a strong, in-person finish to fall 2020,” Servedio said in the email.
LiveSafe itself is a third-party company not associated with Susquehanna. The company’s site says the app uses a “secure, virtual private cloud” to transmit data between the app and the dashboard used by authorities on campus.
According to Lantz, the app will allow students to send anonymous tips on bad behavior among their peers. This, she said, is a key part of keeping coronavirus cases on campus as low as possible.
“We are all in this together so that we can continue to remain on campus together,” said Lantz.
The main page of the app shows several options for the user. The first is the “Student Daily Health Questionnaire,” followed by an option to report a concern and a link to COVID-related resources.
The reporting feature gives the user a shaded text box with which students can describe their concern. There are also three buttons which give reporters the options to submit photo, video and audio files.
Finally, students can choose between sending the report with their name or anonymously and then select “Submit” at the bottom of the screen.
The links provided in the resources page all go to the official website of the Center for Disease Control (CDC). There is also a map feature, though students will need to be on campus and allow LiveSafe to use their location to see the campus map.
The “Student Health Questionnaire” asks four questions: is the student experiencing symptoms; is the student living with or caring for an individual who is a “suspected or confirmed case of COVID-19”; has the student been in contact with anyone “known or suspected to have COVID-19” in the previous 14 days; and, finally, has the student taking the survey tested positive for the coronavirus themselves.
The LiveSafe app is already in use at several other universities around the United States, including Duke University and Yale University, among others.
Many colleges use the LiveSafe app as a tool for students and staff to send reports to and ask for assistance from their respective on-campus public safety or police department.
At Susquehanna, though, public safety officers will not respond to COVID-19 related reports sent from the app.
That data will instead go directly to Lantz and to David Richard, the COVID-19 coordinator and a professor of biology at Susquehanna.
The LiveSafe app can be downloaded for Apple and Android devices and is free to use.
