April 11-17 is National Public Safety Telecommunicators Week! And we want to take a moment to highlight our hardworking U-M Division of Public Safety and Security (DPSS) dispatchers.
This week-long event is a time to celebrate and thank those who dedicate their lives to serving the public. Dispatchers are an essential and crucial part of a public safety team. They are responsible for responding to radio, telephone, and email inquiries from public safety personnel and the general public concerning complaints, emergency situations, and criminal activity.
What are the essential job functions of a U-M dispatcher?
When the need for assistance comes into DPSS Dispatch Services, a communications officer is the first DPSS interaction the University community has, so professionalism and integrity are essential qualities.
Our communications officers receive and triage all service requests for the U-M campus via phone, radio, text, app, email, etc. They monitor multiple radio channels, alarms, emergency notifications, and camera systems and then utilize the appropriate channel to dispatch DPSS resources to the area in which the need for assistance is requested.
What does a ‘day in the life’ of a dispatcher look like?
Our dispatch services team manages, on average, 1,000 phone calls a day. From those phone calls, approximately 400 calls for service require a DPSS security or police officer response. Our communication officers triage and respond to approximately 80 email and web inquiries and actively monitor six radio communication channels, and also monitor alarms, and camera systems daily.
Dispatchers play a vital role in the field of public safety, and we are proud to celebrate our team this week. Thank you again to all of our dispatchers and dispatchers across the country for all the sacrifices they make to create a better and safer world for the public
DPSS is available 24/7 at (734) 763-1131 or 911 in emergencies.