Page 35 - Campus Security & Life Safety, July/August 2019

make an uninformed and potentially pan- icked decision, without reference to any type of plan. In reality, installing video cameras was ineffective at preventing the incident from happening again and inefficient at managing it in real-time.
As part of the solution, it’s important that schools and administrators take a look at the big picture and focus on solutions that pro- vide the right people with the information they need so they can make an informed decision on the next best step without add- ing additional steps or procedures. While the scenario above paints a picture of a common situation facing schools, it is one of many to consider when thinking about risk manage- ment. This scenario alone cannot inform your decision, but rather serve as a starting point for where to begin. When thinking about what is right for each particular facili- ty, asking the right questions is essential. The below are designed to help guide the conver- sation and ensure your risk management solution fits individualized needs.
• Once a new safety system is installed, how are we prepared to utilize it and how will we push that information out?
• What information do we want to be pushed out?
• Whodowewanttosendittoandhowdo we want them to receive it?
By answering questions like these, schools
and administrators can begin to form an out- line of an effective risk management plan which pulls siloed safety measures together and empowers the appropriate parties to take well-informed action to either stop or prevent these unwanted incidents from happening.
A New Type of Hall Monitor
Creating awareness about what’s happening, where it’s happening, and what to do about it saves lives and property. Such knowledge can be difficult to attain when multiple alarm systems are at play—each with its own noti- fication and reporting protocols. Unmoni- tored systems generally only provide local alerting in the form of buzzers, lights, or annunciation panels. For example, a fire alarm goes off when smoke is detected, but it doesn’t tell you where the fire is or where to find the nearest exits so the campus can be safely evacuated.
There are many types of emergencies: an overflowing toilet, a power outage, a tor- nado, an armed intruder, etc. Regardless of the emergency, the first few minutes are critical to determining the outcomes. The role of technology is to improve outcomes for people and property, and that includes preventing bad things from happening and facilitating the appropriate response if an emergency does occur. Reducing confusion,
panic, and communication breakdowns prevents delayed responses that can equate to costly mistakes.
The advantage is that today’s smarter net- works and devices, plus the right software to tie all of them together, make it easier and more cost-effective than ever to create a safe- ty bubble over a single building, wide-area campus, or entire district. In addition to developing emergency preparedness and response plans, campuses can use software to integrate all of their alarm systems and then automate emergency notifications to send real-time information to the appropriate first-responders. That way, when a smoke alarm does go off, people can be alerted to where, why, and what to do about it, rather than just know an alarm has been triggered and that they need to leave the building.
Identify Your Existing Technologies
Another challenge to creating a cohesive technology plan is the unification of real- time monitoring. Make a list. What are the real time alerts you have at your disposal? While this list may not appear to all work together, by simply being alerts they are cre- ating a commonality and an opportunity for monitoring. Any number of life safety, secu- rity, and environmental alarm systems are at work on any given campus at any given time. Then, factor in a combination of voice and data networks, not to mention various com- munication devices. Once these alerts are identified, look at solutions to unify them.
While the evolution of technology has increased the amount of these alerts, it also means an increase in infrastructure and opportunity. Moving from rudimentary to advanced—from radios, handsets and pagers to smartphones, smart TVs, and tablets— there are ample opportunities for communi- cating. For example, a school’s campus is already full of various screens that can be used to improve communication and infor- mation flow, especially in an emergency. Why not leverage that screen real estate to push out critical information to students, teachers and staff ?
Interoperability
Now that a list has been created and a tech- nology inventory established, the next step is interoperability. As mentioned above, on almost every campus and school facility you will find different life safety, security and communication systems that have been installed over the years, but managing all of these systems separately can result in com- munication breakdowns and costly mistakes. While each of these may have been imple- mented with the intention of improving con- nectivity and communication, over time,
operating on their own individual platform can cause more of a problem in itself.
Today’s technology however, can take advantage of existing networks, devices, and other software systems and allow them to work together to enhance emergency alert- ing and response management overall. Every sensor, alarm, and communication end-point can be unified to ensure that key individuals, select groups, or entire popula- tions are able to receive real-time informa- tion about what’s happening on their cam- pus. This interoperability means that a school’s existing technology investments don’t have to go to waste. In fact, their utility can be expanded.
Such interoperability takes a campus or school facility from reactionary and siloed to proactive and holistic in terms of emergency alerting and response management. By unify- ing all of these disparate systems, schools are able to give their campus eyes, ears and a voice, plus the knowledge to take appropriate action. Schools have the technology, they just need to maximize its power. To do this, it’s important that we take a look back at what that process looks like. It begins with schools and their administrators replacing reaction- ary responses with proactive decisions, allow- ing for safety preparedness, rather than a quick fix. The next step is to identify the exist- ing safety technologies that are already imple- mented in the facility, then to ask the major questions on how they can be utilized effi- ciently to provide people with the necessary information to make informed and timely decisions. After these technologies and their abilities are identified, the next step is to bring all of them together into one platform, there- by cutting out the confusion of managing unmonitored and siloed safety solutions. Once this is done, an effective risk manage- ment plan is nearly complete, the final step is to simply work out the finishing touches.
Think back to watching TV with a hand- ful of remotes, rather than just one. Not only is it inconvenient, but ineffective. Using a universal remote to combine all of the separate remotes’ functions together simplifies the process and creates a cohesive unifier. This same principle applies to school safety. When it comes to campus safety, school systems need to utilize secu- rity cameras, fire alarms, door alarms, and other safety measures on one platform to maximize efficiency and improve safety. If using a universal remote is common sense, why isn’t it common sense to use software to tie the various safety measures adminis- tered on a campus together?
Danielle Myers is the general manager of Status Solutions.
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