Fostering a nurturing environment for students is essential to promoting learning in schools and on campuses. Maintaining safety and security while keeping buildings and grounds easily accessible to students, teachers, and staff is an ongoing challenge. Technology-based solutions help to mitigate risks and increase operational efficiency, while preserving a welcoming atmosphere that is so important to student and staff performance.
The SAFER approach uses integrated solutions to increase overall security, enable faster responses to potential risks, and promote a sense of safety among the school or campus community. It covers the ability to:
- Sense: Detect something is happening
- Alert: Notify the right people
- Fortify: Activate fortification systems automatically
- Engage: Target communications to mitigate threats
- Respond: Empower responders with information and communications
Sense
Using artificial intelligence (AI) built-in to video security cameras, school security or facilities staff can detect suspicious activity or unsafe conditions to deter risks or other critical situations before they become a problem. With AI-driven video analytics, intelligent security cameras help detect unsafe behavior or actions that may indicate an unwanted event is about to occur. The cameras can alert staff about crowd formations, persons lying on the ground, vehicles parked in fire lanes, bus loops, or other restricted areas, and more.
With intelligent audio analytics, certain camera types can also detect loud or distinct sounds, such as gunshots, and immediately alert to the possibility of an active threat that needs to be investigated and addressed quickly.
Alert
Integrating video security cameras with the intrusion detection system enables video analytic alerts to trigger notifications to the appropriate staff. For example, the cameras can reliably detect a person attempting to gain access or loitering near locked doors, triggering an alert and sending a text message with an image to administrators or resource officers.
Fortify
Utilize the intrusion system to monitor doors to ensure they are not propped open for unauthorized entry – even when the system is disarmed. With an integrated system, a door left open for longer than a pre-defined time can initiate a text alert to staff, while displaying video of the door from a nearby surveillance camera on the appropriate staff member’s workstation or mobile device.
When an event occurs, school or campus staff can initiate fortification actions automatically. For example, access control systems with programmable threat levels ensure that safety measures or restrictions can be initiated quickly in critical situations. Different threat levels enable unlocking or locking all doors or opening some while locking others.
Engage
Loudspeakers integrated with a video system enables video analytics to trigger automated messages to play on nearby loudspeakers for immediate audio intervention to security or safety risks. Security personnel can also speak directly to individuals informing them that their actions are being monitored.
Respond
To ensure fast and accurate responses to security or safety risks, intrusion system alarms or video analytic alerts can automatically trigger a message to play over security or facility staff’s two-way radios to alert to a possible issue. With the ability for audio or video information to be shared externally, school or campus staff can also notify the appropriate authorities and provide vital information during an incident.
Bosch offers solutions for video surveillance, intrusion detection, access control, and communications that work together to enhance security and safety for educational facilities. To learn more, connect with Bosch to schedule a meeting at Campus Safety Conference West or Campus Safety Conference Texas or register to view the Bosch webinar with Campus Safety magazine.
