Guest Editorial by Todd Piett, VP and General Manager, Rave Mobile Safety at Motorola Solutions

In years gone by, much of our news about schools was consumed in August as media outlets brought us forward-facing stories about district goals, new hires, curriculum changes, updated facilities, and more.

Today, as we hit our 2023 back-to-school stride, it is hard to ignore how the storylines have changed. Mid-summer, for example, we learned about a thwarted active assailant incident at an elementary school in Memphis, Tennessee.

Students and staff were not hurt during that incident, but anyone can guess where the next school safety story will hail from or what the outcome will be.

(Tennessee’s lead law enforcement agency is investigating an officer-involved shooting of a man who allegedly opened fire outside a Jewish school in Memphis on Monday afternoon. Courtesy of Good Morning America and YouTube. Posted on Aug 1, 2023.)

Collaboration is Key

Efforts undertaken by educational officials to better protect students, teachers, and other personnel preemptively or with real-time safety solutions should always be informed by local 9-1-1 guidance.

The Montgomery County Emergency Communication District in Texas is a great example of a public safety authority that embraces a holistic approach to school safety.

Officials there have invested in Rave Panic Button, part of the Motorola Solutions safety ecosystem, to protect the 124,000 K-12 students and school personnel in 130 schools in their jurisdiction.

(The Rave Panic Button mobile app instantly communicates emergencies to 9-1-1, on-site personnel, and first responders for an integrated and immediate response. Upon pressing any of the five emergency buttons, a preset notification is sent to all necessary on-site staff and safety personnel. That same notification is received by 9-1-1, plus additional details about the location of the incident, facility data, and more. This aids first responders in determining the next steps and greatest areas of need before arriving on the scene. Rave Panic Button works for an app, landline, and mobile activations for a true 9-1-1 integration, allowing 9-1-1 to communicate back when the “All Clear” has been confirmed. Courtesy of Rave Mobile Safety, a Motorola Solutions Company, and YouTube.)

They recognized that their schools were being inundated with safety solution offerings, so they vetted technologies and funded the purchase of an easy-to-use, reliable panic button solution for their six school districts.

Panic button apps allow school employees to immediately and simultaneously dial 9-1-1 and people on-site to report an emergency – thus why 10,000 schools nationwide trust Rave Panic Button to protect students and staff.

Strengthening Situational Awareness

When a teacher or administrator selects one of the five features on their smartphone, 9-1-1 will be called. The app determines whether the caller is on a campus they are associated with.

If so, emergency notifications will be automatically generated to campus administrators, school resource officers, designated officials, and employees. During the call, the emergency 9-1-1 call handlers and first responders can access location information and geospatially oriented floor plans that identify stairwells, corridors, egress/ingress points, AEDs, utilities, and more. These details help to expedite and inform response activities.

Additionally, two-way communication is made possible from 9-1-1 as information is being gathered. This includes live-stream videos and status checks from those involved.

School staff members can also perform customizable check-ins with those on-site, and 9-1-1 personnel can communicate back when the “All Clear” has been confirmed. Panic alerts also integrate with emergency systems to broadcast notifications on various channels, including digital signage, video systems, access controls, websites, sirens, and any IoT devices.

Innovations that Inform

School employees use panic button technology during emergencies, including active shooter situations but also for more routine issues such as medical situations, mental health challenges, and school violence.

For events that may not warrant 9-1-1 intervention, faculty and staff can use a Staff Assist feature, which enables authorized employees to communicate with on-site groups or individuals without initiating a call to 9-1-1.

This option can be especially helpful when a teacher or staff member may not feel comfortable speaking up in front of a class or may not have the opportunity to step out of the room.

Of course, panic buttons are just one aspect of the school safety ecosystem. But no matter if the goal is to improve school safety with anonymous or confidential tip reporting, video security equipment, visitor management protocols, access control systems, alert notifications, or two-way radios – educational leaders and public safety officials should begin by assessing the community’s safety and the technologies that make the most sense for their needs.

Public Safety Innovations

So how does this all harken back to the APCO event I mentioned at the outset or public safety collaboration? School safety is rooted in emergency preparedness and response – two areas intrinsically known by 9-1-1 and first responders.

Public safety officials are on the front lines of school safety. They are also aware that there is an influx in funding and new legislation today requiring schools to do more to protect students and staff.

The uptick in school violence, grant opportunities, and mandates come at a time when local public safety answering points (PSAPs) are also looking to enhance safety outcomes by introducing Next Generation 911 capabilities.

NG911 upgrades include video monitoring that can prevent incidents or inform response activities when something does unfold in or around schools. Invaluable footage can be captured from fixed cameras with powerful AI applications, body-worn devices, mobile devices, or drones.

These real-time feeds can not only help to reduce response time, improve officer safety, and inform situational awareness – they can shorten emergency call closeout times – a welcomed benefit for the country’s overworked 9-1-1 workers.

(Learn how versatility meets high performance in the analytics-enabled Avigilon H6SL Camera Line. Available as a bullet or dome factor, this powerful solution comes equipped with Next-Generation Video Analytics to proactively detect critical events and provide superior situational awareness of your site. Courtesy of Motorola Solutions and YouTube. Posted on Jun 21, 2023.)

It makes sense that public safety agencies would want their new 9-1-1 and first responder technologies to integrate well with the latest innovations that schools are securing in the interest of safety.

Simply put – a holistic approach to school safety will help keep students, teachers, staff, and first responders as safe as possible in the new academic year.

About the Author

Todd Piett, the VP and General Manager for Rave Mobile Safety at Motorola Solutions, joined Rave Mobile Safety in 2005.

Before joining Rave, Todd was responsible for launching new products for Unica Corporation, where he helped drive their successful IPO.

Previously, Todd was VP of Product and Marketing for iBelong, a portal provider targeting affinity organizations, and a Program Manager at Dell Computer, where he launched Dell’s branded ISP.

Todd graduated with honors from the United States Military Academy at West Point and holds an MBA from Harvard Business School. After graduating from the United States Military Academy at West Point, he served seven years in the US Army as an aviation officer.

Learn More…

2023 K-12 School Safety Report

To better understand how parents and teachers are feeling about school safety, an independent research company on behalf of Motorola Solutions surveyed 1,000 parents of K-12 students and 1,000 K-12 school educators.

Respondents answered questions about their greatest safety concerns, school emergency planning, communication methods, technology solutions, and training protocols.

“School safety is top of mind for parents and educators alike, with both groups expressing concerns about mental health issues, bullying, and active shooter situations,” explains Mr. Piett.

“Ensuring that school personnel and families are aware of proactive planning practices, the notification methods employed by schools, technologies in place to thwart and report emergencies and school protocols for when incidents occur will not only help to alleviate worries, but ultimately improve safety outcomes.”

(Discover which health and safety challenges should have a renewed focus and why getting back to the basics is more important than ever before. Schools face emergencies almost every day, from coronavirus exposure scares to mental health emergencies to the unthinkable. Communication is key throughout any critical event. With Rave, its lifesaving technology has proven to be a cost-effective way of improving the safety of everyone in your school community through mobile panic buttons, mass notifications, and early intervention technology to prevent dangerous incidents and respond faster to emergencies. Courtesy of Rave Mobile Safety, a Motorola Solutions Company, and YouTube.)

Key findings from the report include:

• Safety and preparedness plans are key to gaining parents’ and teachers’ trust:

  • When looking at schools, parents and teachers both rank school safety as a critical factor (66% for parents, 72% for teachers).

• Student mental health continues to be a top concern:

  • Sixty-four percent of parents and 68% of teachers are very or extremely concerned about students’ mental health. Additionally, parents and teachers are worried about the mental health of community members who may perpetrate acts of violence on a school campus and teachers’ mental health.

• Communication channels before and during crisis events are essential:

  • Nearly half of teachers (48%) say that they are able to submit anonymous or confidential tips to their school, public safety or both, compared to 43% of parents. In the event of an emergency, 57% of teachers indicate they would typically use a classroom phone to call the main office – a time-consuming approach that does not simultaneously loop in school district officials, 9-1-1 call handlers or first responders who may need to act fast.

• School safety technology is in use — and can help to put parents at ease:

  • Seventy-one percent of teachers say that their school has adopted new safety technology in the last two years, but 54% of parents say they haven’t seen new technologies implemented.

  • This disparity presents an opportunity for schools to periodically communicate with parents about the safety solutions they’re implementing to reduce risk or expedite response.

  • Almost half (46%) of parents say panic button apps that allow teachers and school staff to quickly notify 9-1-1 would increase their confidence in school safety.

• Nearly all teachers and parents report participation in lockdown drills:

  • Eighty-nine percent of parents say their child has participated in a school lockdown drill, with 96% of teachers reporting the same.

  • Eighty-two percent of parents say their child has participated in a drill specifically for active shooter preparedness, while 73% of teachers have participated in such drills with students and another 10% without students.

  • Thirty-six percent of teachers have not engaged in training with first responders, but they want to.

To view the full survey findings, download the 2023 K-12 School Safety Report.

 

Rave Mobile Safety Takes Platinum & Gold in 2022 ‘ASTORS’ Homeland Security Awards

American Security, Today’s Annual ‘ASTORS’ Awards, is the preeminent U.S. Homeland Security Awards Program, and now in its Eighth Year, continues to recognize industry leaders of Physical and Border Security, Cybersecurity, Emergency Preparedness – Management and Response, Law Enforcement, and First Responders as well as federal, state and municipal government agencies in the acknowledgment of their outstanding efforts to Keep our Nation Secure.

 

Rave Mobile Safety (First of Two)

Best Incident Response System

• Rave Aware

• As the nature of active assailant incidents become more complex, it’s become abundantly clear that a holistic approach is an essential part of emergency management and hazard response.

• A recent survey by Rave Mobile Safety has confirmed that emergency personnel would like better interoperability regarding crisis communications.

• However, sharing incident data isn’t easily remedied with updates and new technology, as some towns and jurisdictions operate with older systems that cannot integrate with today’s innovative solutions.

• This is why having a one-stop solution that can communicate across disparate technologies, departments, and jurisdictions is essential for safety, and many officials are starting to realize the importance of data integration. By prioritizing collaboration, with a tool like Rave Aware, responding parties will be able to share emergency data across agencies, software, and borders.

• Rave Aware is a secure cloud-based data aggregation platform that allows agencies to publish live, real-time CAD data in their preferred format for rules-based processing, notifications, and permission-based cross-party sharing, and gives dispatchers, first responders, and other emergency services personnel the situational awareness and information they need to respond quickly and cohesively to critical incidents.

• The Rave Aware is built to function like a hub-and-spoke, facilitating and integrating different CAD systems, workflows, and software into a unified platform for emergency response, and allows different authorities to share life-saving information and cohesively participate in a unified response effort. 

• Rave Aware helps protect callers, responders, and their communities by reducing the time required to respond to events and better coordinating public safety’s response to 9-1-1 calls. The tool is also highly cost-effective so that even the most budget-strained agencies can improve their proactive and response strategies.

(Learn how to use Rave Aware and the Rave Platform to make comprehensive data-driven decisions thanks to situational awareness and real-time data sharing. Courtesy of Rave Mobile Safety and Vimeo.)

• Rave Aware offers web-connected incident mapping, real-time data searching, secure data sharing between agencies, CJIS-compliant cloud tools, and task management for improved collaboration. Users of the tool cite the value it delivers on streamlined communications. 

• Rave Aware helps communities seamlessly collaborate on critical communications and emergency response when every second counts and lives are on the line.

 

Rave Mobile Safety (Second of Two)

Best Mobile Technology Product

• Rave Aware

• The U.S. has experienced more than 2,032 school shootings since 1970, and these numbers are increasing.

• Alarmingly, over 948 school shootings have taken place since the tragedy at Sandy Hook Elementary School in December 2012. With these events, unfortunately, becoming more common, public safety officials and school administrators must be prepared to respond immediately in the event of an emergency.

• In the wake of Sandy Hook, Rave Mobile Safety worked with law enforcement and school safety officials to develop Rave Panic Button, and today it is the most widely used and trusted school safety app across the country, with implementations being used in nearly 50 states.

• When one of the buttons is pushed, 9-1-1 center dispatchers and first responders can view detailed caller locations, floor plans, entrance and exit locations, emergency contacts, and key procedures for a more coordinated and cohesive response, for a level of situational awareness that is paramount during adverse events.

• Additionally, Rave Panic Button can help designated school personnel respond to the emergency while waiting for first responders to arrive. For example, if someone needed CPR and the panic button was activated, a school nurse would be notified via an alert and could reach the student and begin medical response while waiting for paramedics to arrive – significantly improving the chances for a better outcome.

(Learn how the Rave Panic Button can enhance collaboration with 9-1-1, first responders, and authorized personnel for emergency planning and panic button drills. Courtesy of Rave Mobile Safety and Vimeo.)

• Rave Panic Button brings immense value to communities across the country, and saves precious critical response time, protecting students, teachers, and first responders by getting the right resources to an emergency at the right time.

• *Rave Mobile Safety has also been recognized as a Multi-‘ASTORS’ Awards Champion, having secured multiple Wins in the 2020, 2019, 2018, and 2017 ‘ASTORS’ Homeland Security Awards Program.