OSU
Cowboy Alert — Emergency Notification System
Oklahoma State University's Stillwater emergency notification system is branded Cowboy Alert, an AT&T RAVE-powered service that pushes a phone call, text message, and/or email to members of the OSU community in a situation deemed an emergency; campus and city outdoor warning sirens supplement it for severe weather, and members opt in and manage contact numbers through their O-Key account.
Read the official policyInstitution
Oklahoma State University
Public R1 · OK
~27,241 studentsCowboy Alert
In the policy’s own words
What the policy says
Cowboy Alert vendor and purposeverbatim
Oklahoma State University has partnered with AT&T RAVE to implement a service called Cowboy Alert that will notify those in the Cowboy community who have signed up for the service in the event of an emergency.
- — Names AT&T RAVE as the platform and confirms Cowboy Alert is an opt-in ('have signed up') emergency service.
Emergency message channelsverbatim
In a situation deemed an emergency, OSU officials will deploy a message to members of the OSU community with information regarding the event and how they should proceed. This information will likely be in the form of a phone call, text message and/or email.
- — Establishes the three delivery modes — phone call, text, and/or email — and the action-oriented content ('how they should proceed').
Scope limit on weather alertsverbatim
These emergencies may include a campus intruder, acts of terrorism, or biohazard threats. Additionally, alerts will not be used for weather-related events unless the situation poses a threat to the lives of people on campus.
- — Defines the scope envelope and explicitly excludes routine weather from Cowboy Alert, reserving it for life-threatening situations.
Outdoor warning siren test scheduleverbatim
The City of Stillwater tests the outdoor warning sirens on the first Tuesday of every month at 11:30 a.m. If the weather is stormy that day, they will not test the sirens.
- — Documents the supplementary siren layer for severe weather and its monthly first-Tuesday test, with a stormy-weather exception.
At a glance
How this policy works
- When it activates
- Cowboy Alert is deployed in a situation deemed an emergency — examples cited by OSU include a campus intruder, acts of terrorism, or biohazard threats. OSU explicitly states that Cowboy Alert will not be used for weather-related events unless the situation poses a threat to the lives of people on campus; routine severe weather is handled via outdoor warning sirens.
- Who decides
- OSU officials deploy Cowboy Alert messages in a situation deemed an emergency; OSU Police (university police services) operate the alert function. The exact named approval authority and a written 'confirmation' standard were not reproduced verbatim in the public sources reviewed and are not asserted here.
- Timeliness standard
- OSU describes Cowboy Alert as the channel by which officials deploy a message to the OSU community in an emergency with information on how to proceed; a specific 'without delay' or minutes-based timeliness standard was not reproduced verbatim in the public sources reviewed.
- Emergency notification vs. timely warning
- OSU frames Cowboy Alert as its emergency-notification mechanism and ties Clery compliance to CSA reporting: timely reporting allows the University to assess the necessity of issuing a timely emergency notification or warning. Campus Security Authorities are required to report specified Clery crimes on campus, in surrounding public areas, and in certain non-campus OSU buildings.
- Testing cadence
- Cowboy Alert's own notification-system test cadence was not reproduced verbatim in the public sources reviewed. The supplementary outdoor warning sirens (operated by the City of Stillwater) are tested on the first Tuesday of every month at 11:30 a.m., weather permitting.
- Scope & limits
- Cowboy Alert is reserved for situations deemed emergencies (e.g., campus intruder, terrorism, biohazard) and is not used for weather events unless lives on campus are threatened. It is opt-in via O-Key, so reach is limited to those who have subscribed and kept their contact information current. Severe-weather warning is delegated to the campus and city outdoor warning sirens.
ChannelsPhone CallSmsEmailSiren
Analysis
Reading the policy
Oklahoma State University-Stillwater operates its campus emergency notification system under the brand Cowboy Alert — distinct from Oregon State University's separately-archived "OSU Alert," despite the shared OSU abbreviation. Per OSU Campus & Public Safety, the university has partnered with AT&T RAVE to implement a service called Cowboy Alert that will notify those in the Cowboy community who have signed up for the service in the event of an emergency. In a situation deemed an emergency, OSU officials will deploy a message to members of the OSU community with information regarding the event and how they should proceed, in the form of a phone call, text message and/or email.
The system is opt-in: students, faculty, and staff register their phone through their O-Key account under "Campus Alerts" to subscribe to Cowboy Alert and receive text messages and/or voicemails, and they update their contact number under "Emergency Contacts" in the same account. OSU narrows the scope of Cowboy Alert deliberately: emergencies may include a campus intruder, acts of terrorism, or biohazard threats, and OSU states that alerts will not be used for weather-related events unless the situation poses a threat to the lives of people on campus — routing routine severe weather to the outdoor warning siren network instead.
For severe weather, OSU-Stillwater relies on outdoor warning sirens operated by the City of Stillwater. The city tests the outdoor warning sirens on the first Tuesday of every month at 11:30 a.m. (skipping the test if the weather is stormy that day), and campus tornado sirens sound a three- to five-minute blast when a tornado warning is issued. OSU's Clery framing is conventional: timely reporting of crimes allows the University to assess the necessity of issuing a timely emergency notification or warning to the campus community, and Campus Security Authorities (CSAs) are required to report specified crimes occurring on campus, in public areas surrounding campus, and in certain non-campus buildings owned or leased by OSU.
Because okstate.edu hosts return HTTP 403 to automated fetching in this environment, the verbatim excerpts below were captured from official OSU Campus Safety, OSU Police, and OSU-system page text as reproduced in search results and corroborated across multiple independent queries; decision-authority and timing detail not reproduced verbatim is paraphrased and flagged where uncertain.
Takeaways
Key findings
OSU-Stillwater's emergency notification system is branded Cowboy Alert (powered by AT&T RAVE) — not 'OSU Alert,' which is Oregon State's separately-archived system.
Cowboy Alert is opt-in: members subscribe and manage their contact number through their O-Key account ('Campus Alerts' / 'Emergency Contacts').
Emergency messages are delivered as a phone call, text message, and/or email, telling recipients how to proceed.
OSU deliberately limits Cowboy Alert to life-safety emergencies (campus intruder, terrorism, biohazard) and does not use it for weather unless lives on campus are at risk.
Severe-weather warning is delegated to outdoor warning sirens that the City of Stillwater tests on the first Tuesday of each month at 11:30 a.m.
Policy, meet practice
When this system actually fired
5 documented times OSU’s alert system was used, from the case archive.
Provenance
Sources
- Official
- Official
- Official
- Clery ASR
- Official
Tags
policyemergency-notificationtimely-warningclery-actcowboy-alertravepublic-r1oklahoma
Added 2026-06-21Updated 2026-06-21Via ingestion