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Special Supplement: Securing the Campus
A Multi-Pronged Plan
7/1/2007
Sgt. Paul Giardino, of the MSU campus police, concurs. A self-professed gadget geek, he was part of the development team that created the Rave console. He also stresses that in an emergency, he now has access to more information than ever before about those he protects. He can pinpoint where a student in trouble is, and get immediate access to the student’s photo and verbal description. Giardino also relates that while some students are very cautious about safety and welcome the protection, others may be blasé about it, or may simply be hesitant to call campus police. Now, however, campus members are protected whether they are proactive or not. “If something happens, I have them on the line. It provides them with that extra measure of security,” he points out.
As to the Big Brother effect, Giardino insists it’s a nonissue, because the tracking system has to be activated by the telephone’s owner. And it’s a good thing that the tracking system is on a need-to-use basis, says Giardino, because, “If I had to know where everyone who was okay was, I’d go out of my mind,” he quips.
LAYER AND INTEGRATE
Steven Healy is not only president of the International Association of Campus Law Enforcement Administrators, but also the chief of police for Princeton University (NJ). Healy believes strongly that emergencies need to be communicated via cell phone, so Princeton has opted for the Connect-Ed solution from The NTI Group for disseminating critical information. But the university also employs a variety of other security tools and technologies in its strategic physical security efforts, including a C-Cure automated card access system from Software House, which the institution currently uses for all perimeter and some interior doors (and is gradually implementing for more interior doors). Healy likes the idea of intelligent video, as well: He says that after about 20 minutes, humans’ effectiveness at watching monitors begins to diminish rapidly, so it is far better to be alerted by the system, when there’s an indication of a problem. However, intelligent video is not yet a reality at Princeton, largely due to cost. Instead, the school is in the process of linking its Verint campus video monitoring system with the C-Cure card access system, to enable bi-directional communication between the systems.
Importantly, Healy advocates layering security technologies. If the foundation is the card access system, for instance, then biometrics, voice recognition, basic videos, and analytic video can be added on top. Currently, Princeton is considering various forms of biometrics, including iris scans from LG Electronics.
Still, thinking ahead to integration issues is vital, he points out. “If card access is the first thing that you do,” he says, ask yourself: “How will new programs integrate with the system we have?” Elliot Alan Boxerbaum, president and CEO of
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