Last week, the University of California at Berkeley recalled students from its academics-abroad programs in Israel, the same day the State Department warned U.S. citizens to defer travel to Israel, the West Bank and Gaza.
Escalating violence has prompted other schools, such as the University of Washington and the University of Colorado, to heed the warning and recall students from Israel.
Awareness is critical for students who are studying in volatile regions such as the Middle East, where advisories might not be covered by Rough Guides or media outlets such as CNN.
Now, students can receive real-time travel intelligence and emergency assistance services when traveling abroad using iJet, a service powered by ex-spies running a network of computers that rivals the CIA.
Intelligence analysts monitor more than 5,000 sources of information in over 180 countries at iJet's North American Intelligence Operations Center in Annapolis, Maryland.
The service provides time-sensitive, real-time intelligence to travelers in order to "close the gap between when a good guidebook is published and now," said Bruce McIndoe, CEO of iJet.
The center is staffed 24 hours a day, seven days a week, by more than 30 geographic analysts and subject-matter experts from the National Security Agency, the CIA and other international government intelligence agencies who continually monitor breaking news feeds, Web resources and human sources around the world.
Analysts generate travel intelligence alerts, which summarize each situation and advise travelers on how to best manage a disruption.
"Technology is the great equalizer in bringing real-time intelligence that was previously relegated to heads of state and top brass of corporations," McIndoe said. "(IJet) is essentially a public NSA disseminating intelligence to the masses."
IJet recently announced an agreement to provide its Worldcue Traveler service to Grand Valley State University's International Study programs.
The service monitors students' itineraries for everything from bad weather and transportation delays to health risks, strikes and civil disturbances.
Universities that sign up can relay information or instructions to staff and students. Also, an electronic database keeps track of where students are and what they are doing, which could help assuage families' concerns for student safety in a post-Sept. 11 world.
"Students are going for shorter periods into situations where they might be less prepared," said Brett Berquist, director of international program development for Grand Valley State.
IJet's basic Worldcue Traveler services costs $25 for each customized travel report, which includes travel alerts, medical and travel assistance, and a personalized website tailored to a specific itinerary. For $47.95 per week, travelers can rent an international cell phone with a personal guardian service that is preconfigured to receive travel alerts.
Students can receive alerts by e-mail, phone, fax, pager or PDA. Those who sign up will have round-the-clock, toll-free access to iJet's medical and travel assistance center, bypassing time delays and language barriers. Students can select up to three other e-mail accounts for friends and family to receive advisories.
IJet's technology is invaluable, Berquist said, because "it's delivering (information) in a way that's very appealing to students."
Student travelers will be provided with the service before, during and up to 30 days after their trip abroad. So if a region were to have an epidemic, for example, students could watch for symptoms after they had traveled in the area.
Most travelers get health information from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and receive security information from the U.S. Department of State, which provides free travel warnings.
But iJet officials claim they publish information weeks, if not months, before the same warnings appear in these government agencies' reports. While the State Department publishes six to 10 alerts each month, iJet puts out between 400 and 500 alerts per month, McIndoe said.
Unlike iJet, the CDC does not provide country-specific health information or monitor the dynamics of outbreaks of various diseases within countries, McIndoe said.
Other travel security companies such as International SOS Assistance and Control Risks Group offer similar tracking services for travelers.
But right now, iJet is the only aggregator of information that might affect travelers across 10 intelligence categories, McIndoe said. Analysts sort through layers of information to provide targeted intelligence that might affect travelers, verifying all information before pushing it out.
Over the next three to four months, iJet expects to expand into the student market as the summer and fall semester-abroad programs commence.
Whether universities will sign up remains to be seen, however. Public schools must approve pricing for this type of service.
"It's basically information you could find for free if you had the time to get it," Berquist said.
But for Berquist, the cost of iJet's service is nominal compared with the amount of time it would take his staff to monitor 30 different faculty-led international programs in 18 different countries.
"No one has that kind of time," Berquist said.
