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Safety resources on center stage during universitywide events, training

Campus Safety Day will take place Tuesday across all three campuses. ORACLE PHOTO/LEDA ALVIM

University Police (UP) and USF Emergency Management will immerse the campus community in training and events during Campus Safety Day on Tuesday to promote awareness and showcase safety resources available across all three campuses.

The Tampa event will take place from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on the north side of the Marshall Student Center (MSC), around the topiary bull. Around 20 USF and non-USF organizations will be in attendance to present safety resources to students, faculty and staff, including the Counseling Center, College of Public Health’s Activist Lab and Mothers Against Drunk Driving.

“It is an all-encompassing holistic approach to giving the campus population — students, faculty and staff — an idea of what safety-related services are available to them,” said assistant emergency planner at the Tampa campus Rob Marlow.

Attendees will get to participate in raffles to win prizes, including gift cards and a Tampa Bay Lightning hat signed by goaltender Andrei Vasilevskiy. Food trucks, live music, exhibitors and vendors whom attendees can talk to about safety procedures will also be at the event, according to public information representative from the USF Tampa Police Department Audrey G. Clarke.

The Emergency Management department will also offer in-person and online trainings Wednesday for those interested in expanding their expertise and skills on topics like self-defense and CPR/AED.

Virtual trainings include Rape Aggression Defense by UP at 9-10 a.m., Campus Connect Suicide Prevention by the Counseling Center from 10 a.m. to noon and ways to prepare for natural disasters by the National Weather Service Tampa Bay from 1-2 p.m. All online trainings will take place on Microsoft Teams and students, faculty and staff can register to attend on the department’s website.

Two in-person trainings will be offered as well at MSC 2708, including the Active Threat/Stop the Bleed from 2-4:30 p.m. and the Citizen CPR/AED from 5:30-7 p.m.

The branch campuses will also feature events. At the Sarasota-Manatee campus, departments such as the Department Emergency Management and UP will hold a table in front of their main rotunda from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Attendees can interact with employees from these on- and off-campus departments and ask them questions about safety.

The St. Pete campus police department, alongside the St. Pete Safety and Compliance Team, will table from noon to 2 p.m. on the Harborwalk. Attendees will be provided with safety-related information and get to ask safety-related questions around campus.

The organizers like to bring attention to safety-related organizations and agencies around Tampa Bay. Marlow said they want to show people the variety of services that USF and community partners can provide to the campus population.

“I highly recommend for everyone to get certified in first aid, CPR, trauma and stop the bleeding type of training. Usually, that type of [training] is expensive, so if you can get it for free, that’s awesome,” said Marlow.

Aisling Carr, program assistant at the Tampa campus Department of Emergency Management, said there will be 30 spots open to each in-person training session.

Clarke said there are different resources on and off campus that people might now know about and hopes the event brings awareness to them.

“A lot of times, people do not know the resources and the services that departments at USF and around the Tampa Bay area provide, so this is a way for a one-on-one basis that you could go around,” said Clarke.