Last week, IU attempted to prepare its students and staff for something that is certainly on the mind of every young person. It’s an uncontrollable, carnal force that we live with. It’s natural to have questions about it.
IU Notify warned the event in question could begin with “a shaking that starts out to be gentle” but escalate quickly to a “violent jolt.”
That’s right, we’re talking about earthquakes — incidences that, in Indiana, are about as likely as the election actually being rigged. Sorry, Donald.
As in, the likelihood is very low. IU’s press release states that since 2001, only three earthquakes with a magnitude of at least five have occurred in southern Indiana.
It’s noble for IU to take such an interest in our health and safety. Especially during our college years, it’s important to learn about measures we can take to protect ourselves and others.
IU Notify’s plan to prepare everyone for this unlikely natural disaster was to interrupt classes last Thursday with a prompt for everyone to spend ten to fifteen minutes underneath their desks.
Of course, this prompt was very easy for professor’s to ignore by clicking “Acknowledge” and continuing with their lesson plan.
The reasoning for this drill was that southern Indiana is situated at a “crossroads of two significant seismic zones.” However, this is the first time IU has really participated in a drill like this, despite southern Indiana always being in the same place.
If the seismic zones we are sitting on were as dangerous as they were made to seem last week, we should have heard of them by now.
Meanwhile, we have not had an all-campus drill of this caliber for dangerous events with larger likelihoods, such as an active shooter or a blow dart bandit or a swift stampede of wildebeests.
The earthquake “Shakeout” drill was not, of course, issued with any kind of ill will or desire to waste student and faculty time. It was simply a confusing decision that came all at once, causing students to ask questions about how big the threat of an earthquake actually is.
It would be interesting to see IU put the energy surrounding this sort of campaign strategy into preparing students for things our campus actually struggles with.
Perhaps a pop-up on Canvas that teaches you about how to handle your crippling student debt or a call for professors to carve out fifteen minutes of class time to have a frank discussion with students about sexual assault and consent.
Regardless of what IU chooses to do with the potential success of this type of drill, we can agree on one thing: the literature on what to expect out of an earthquake uses some incredibly erotic language.
