DEREKH FROUDE/Arizona Daily Wildcat Director of counseling and psychological services Ken Marsh and President Pete Likins address the crowd Monday at a Town Hall meeting to discuss campus safety.

The UA is developing emergency response measures that will help students and faculty better assess and cope with violent situations, said a panel of administrators at town halls Friday and Monday.

In the far-ranging discussions, which were billed as forums on making connections across campus in a time of crisis, the panel talked about response to threats, classroom discipline and continued fallout from last month's shootings at the College of Nursing.

Plans to deal with threats include an assessment team that will determine levels of threats made on campus, as well as how individual situations should be handled.

An emergency response team is mobilized whenever there is a high-level crisis, said Patti Ota, vice president for executive affairs and university initiatives.

That team is made up of officials from many of the departments represented on the panel. Attendees at the forums included representatives from the dean of students office, university police, human resources, risk management, counseling and psychological services, executive affairs and university initiatives, life and work connections, communication and news services, as well as President Pete Likins and Provost George Davis.

It is critical to report any direct threat immediately, said University of Arizona Police Department Cmdr. Brian Seastone. No one should be fearful of calling 911.

UA students expressed concerns as to whether safety can ever be guaranteed when there are no definite warnings of this type of behavior.

Panel members had no definitive response.

Unity and communication remained a dominant theme in plans for making the campus safer, and Likins encouraged students, faculty and staff to become comfortable asking for help.

The panel also expressed its admiration to the UA community for its strength after the shootings at the College of Nursing.

"The healing process continues. I understand that for some of us that will take a long time," Likins said.

Audience members at the forums asked what rights professors have to deal with unruly students, and how the university can educate professors to protect themselves.

Faculty can temporarily dismiss students from a classroom for a code of conduct violation, or can call UAPD for removal of the student and can immediately remove the student if the professor was threatened, said Dean of Students Melissa Vito.

What constitutes a student Code of Conduct violation can range from disrupting a class to making threats.

Immediately after dismissing a student, an official complaint must be filed by the professor to the Dean of Students office, where it will be reviewed and proper disciplinary measures taken.

However, some members of the UA community said that the primary focus of UA officials should be preventive. Robert Stewart Flores Jr., the disgruntled nursing student who killed three of his professors, had been disruptive in class, and his attitude had prompted the teachers he eventually shot to fear him.

Dennis Embry, a national violence expert and audience member, expressed the need to conduct a forensic analysis of Flores that will allow researchers to determine what biological problems caused his actions.

Specifically, he is interested in studying whether Flores suffered brain injuries in a car-crash that could have changed his personality and behavior, he said.

"This is something we must study," said Dr. Ray Woosley, vice president for health sciences. "We definitely have the resources."

In response to the shootings on campus, the Chronicle of Higher Education conducted an open online forum Thursday afternoon. Ann H. Franke, vice president for education and risk management for United Educators Insurance was the guest.

Students and faculty from colleges and universities throughout the country attended the forum to have a common question answered: "How can colleges protect faculty members from violence at the hands of their own students?"

Students and faculty joined the forum with comments and suggestions for campus safety.

"Are there arguments that will persuade our governor and Legislature to invest the necessary funds into protecting our facility?" asked a faculty member who identified himself as "Dan."

Franke stated that legal responsibility centers primarily on an "employer's legal obligation to maintain a safe workplace," as well as liability for ignoring signs of violence.

Colleagues and campus resources, such as UAPD, the Office of the Dean of Students and CAPS are available to the entire UA community.

The Office of the Dean of Students conducts welfare checks on students whose teachers, friends or parents are concerned with their behavior, or have not heard from or seen them for a period of time, said Veda Kowalski, associate dean of students.

Counseling and Psychological Services offers help to at-risk students and faculty.

"Now, we will get students in immediately, when they are ready," said CAPS director Kenneth Marsh.

In the past, students often had to wait a week to be seen by psychological services.

The Heath Sciences Center will be offering Brown Bag Workshops Nov. 25 through Nov. 27 that will discuss campus security, communication and stress management in a time of crisis.