All ISU Campuses Lockdown Drill October 20, 2026

All Idaho State University campuses (Pocatello, Idaho Falls, Meridian) will conduct a lockdown drill on Tuesday, October 20, 2026, at approximately 9:15 a.m. The lockdown drill will provide students, faculty, and staff with an opportunity to practice emergency procedures. This drill is designed to evaluate the University’s emergency preparedness for an active shooter or other threat event. Electronic access control systems will be temporarily suspended during the lockdown drill. This restriction applies across all facilities using card access, including residential housing, academic buildings, research laboratories, and general facility entry points.

Members of the campus community are encouraged to familiarize themselves with the lockdown procedures outlined in the Emergency Action Plan: lock doors, turn off lights, move out of sight, maintain silence, and prepare to avoid danger or defend yourself as a last resort. Students, faculty, and staff should also understand the difference between the terms “lockdown” and “Shelter-in-Place” that the University may use during an emergency.

“This lockdown drill is intended to be a practice to better simulate how people would respond,” said ISU Director of Public Safety Marc Pino. “Most people feel that drills make them better prepared and make them feel safer, but we still have work to do in providing information and lowering anxiety levels to this new drill.”

Public Safety’s RAVE notification system will be used to communicate when the drill begins and ends. The drill is expected to last approximately ten minutes, and faculty and staff are encouraged to communicate with students about the drill. Faculty and staff are not expected to answer questions about how the police or Public Safety will respond in the event of an emergency. A survey included in the RAVE messaging after the drill will be the best opportunity for people to ask those questions.

As with annual fire drills, this lockdown exercise will cause a brief disruption to normal campus activity. ISU Public Safety staff and volunteers will observe the drill. There will be no police response and no external stimuli, such as simulated gunshots, during the drill, though local police may be on campus to participate. Every notification about the event will explicitly state that it is a drill.

To confirm your information is accurate for emergency notifications to your cell phone, visit MyISU and click on the ISU Emergency Notification System under the ISU Alerts and Public Safety card.