Family and Home Security Information

The Virginia Tech campus shooting further emphasized the need for colleges, universities and schools to implement emergency procedures to ensure effective and quick communication with students, parents, teachers and staff during an emergency. Emergency mass notification systems offer this ability using features that enable mass text, e-mail and voice message delivery to hundreds of contacts within seconds. Now, many schools — and companies — are adopting these systems in order to keep their students and employees safe.

Selective Mass Notification System

COMMUNICATES THROUGH TEXT MESSAGING;

The Web-based campus communication system features a central interface that allows users to self-administer and manage time-sensitive information in minutes to students, faculty, staff, campus security and first responders. The system uses the supplier’s network to send SMS text message alerts to subscribed cell phones, wireless PDAs, pagers, school and personal e-mail accounts, personal Web browser portals and RSS readers. The system also includes a bulletin board feature that allows school officials to post an emergency message on the school’s Web site without having to contact the school’s Webmaster. The central interface allows administrators to set up accounts and groups, create registration forms and bulletin boards, send advisories, manage subscribers and view reports.

Web-Based School Emergency Notification System

DELIVERS MESSAGES SIMULTANEOUSLY TO MOBILE DEVICES

Within minutes of an emergency, school officials can use the system to deliver a single, clear message to students, parents and guardians by phone, cell phone, e-mail, pager or PDA. Customized messages can be created and updated in real-time for a number of situations, students or groups. Schools can also increase preparedness by preparing messages beforehand to handle emergency or routine situations. The system eliminates paper and phone-tree communications as well as the costs required to maintain auto-dial or broadcast e-mail systems. Students, parents and guardians enter their contact information on a secure Web site and can then define how they wish to receive messages. Honeywell Security System Alert for Schools and Business, Honeywell.

School Mass Notification System

OFFERS THREE SERVICE LEVELS TO FIT VARYING NEEDS

The system streamlines voice and text emergency communications to thousands of parents, students, faculty and staff members using a variety of communication devices. Users may choose from three service levels. The standard edition enables users to access the system online or by phone; to designate student, parent and guardian relationships for future communication; and to send absentee, informative and emergency voice and text notifications. The premium edition adds polling, ad-hoc reporting and conference call capabilities. The ultra edition further allows users to build pre-set scenarios; implement a customized caller ID function; create fields that collect, filter and report meaningful information; and send quota-based notifications.

Outdoor Mobile Public Alerting System

DELIVERS EMERGENCY MESSAGES IN HIGH-VOLUME AREAS

The mobile, self-contained system issues audio messages via live voice, recorded and/or siren tones throughout high-population and wide geographic areas. The communication can be used in situations that call for emergency evacuation, crowd control, voice deterrents and critical area warnings. The central command platform can function via wireless, fiber optic or broadband communications, and interoperability is supported by UHF/wide-band and VHF/narrow-band radio frequency capabilities. The system also conducts surveillance and relays visual information from an emergency scene.

VoIP Emergency Notification System

DELIVERS PRE-RECORDED MESSAGES TO DESIGNATED PHONE NUMBERS

The emergency communication system uses Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) to send a message to a database of telephone numbers, e-mail addresses and fax numbers. The system includes an instant callback feature, which gives parents and students the option to make a return call to a designated phone number by pressing a single key. A real-time reporting feature allows school personnel to immediately determine which students have been reached by telephone and which have received e-mail messages. The system will then continue to call those students who have not been reached. Users may also create custom call groups — for example, groups of students who live in a particular dormitory or in an off-campus residence — and specify which groups will receive messages first. Emergency Notification System, Global Connect .

Conference-Enabled Emergency Notification System

NOTIFIES AND BRIDGES RECIPIENTS INTO IMMEDIATE CONFERENCE

The system’s quick-join conferencing feature can bridge contacts into a telephone conference call within seconds after notifying them of an emergency, which expedites handling of a crisis for better outcomes of events. When notifying, the system “looks” for individuals at work, at home or on cell phones and can leave alternative messages when it has not reached a person. The system sends voice and text emergency messages to e-mail, fax, digital and alpha pagers, PDAs and cell phones using group lists created from a master database. It also includes Command Mapper, which enables users to identify geographic areas on a map and notify recipients in those areas. The system can be used as a stand-alone system or hosted at the supplier’s secure data center site.

Technorati Tags: Campus Security, School Emergency, School Emergency Procedures, Virginia Tech, Emergency Communication, School Emergency Notification, School Mass Notification, School Security, Campus Security

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Exercise Rejuvinates Tissue; Stops Aging

Research conducted on seniors in Canada shows that weight training can actually reverse aging in the muscle tissue of healthy senior citizens. The study, co-led by Dr. Mark Tarnopolsky of McMaster University Medical Centre in Hamilton, Ont., took 25 healthy seniors over age 65 and put them on a weight lifting program of two hours a week for six months.

They then compared their tissue samples to a similar analysis taken from younger healthy men and women in their 20s who did the same exercises: Before exercise training, the older adults were 59 per cent weaker than the younger adults.

After the training the strength of the older adults improved by about 50 per cent, so that they were only 38 per cent weaker than the young adults. “After training, they were halfway back to the strength of a young person,” reports Tarnopolsky.

No need to buy expensive weight training equipment. A few small dumb bells and you’re on your way.

If you have not lifted any weights in a long time then follow these simple instructions.

• Start Slow With a Few Repetitions
• Use Light Weights For The Upper Body (5-10 Pounds to Start With)
• Rather Than Squats Get Some Ankle Weights, Sit and Lift
• Just 10 minutes About Two or Three Times A Week

This is not a one shot deal. Make a commitment of 20-30 minutes and you will see a difference in a short time. Stay committed and you will be able to do things you have not done in a while. Some of the benefits you will see will be an ease in performing day-to-day tasks, preventing broken and soft bones, improved walking strength, better sleep, sense of overall well being.

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Inadequately protected windows are easy marks for intruders who know how to force them without too much effort.  Fortunately, reinforcing windows in your home is neither difficult nor expensive.  Most measures require just a little bit of skill, a few basic tools, and the right hardware.

Evaluate Windows For Security And Strength?

First, survey the windows of your home.  Check out each for its ability to withstand an attack, paying special attention to basement windows and any windows that can be reached from the ground level.  Then list each one on paper, noting the type of window and the locking mechanism currently securing it.

Keep in mind that you’ll need to replace the original locks on most windows with sturdy, reliable ones. For example, ordinary sash locks on double-hung windows squeeze out drafts, but provide little security.  A would-be intruder can simply insert a knife up between the sashes and turn the lock to its open position, or exert enough pressure to snap the hardware. 

Windows don’t always have to be closed to shut out potential thieves.  Some locks allow you to secure a window in a partly open position for ventilation.  No matter how your windows are secured, whether they’re locked or fastened shut in some other fashion, consider how you and your family could exit them in an emergency.  And if you install locks, keep the keys nearby and make sure everyone knows where they are.

You may be asking ‘what good are window locks if an intruder can simply break the glass to get in?’  Glass is somewhat of a deterrent in its own right because it slows an intruder down and the broken shards have the potential to injure, but shattering glass attracts the kind of attention that burglars don’t want.  If you don’t feel secure about glass, you can replace it with impact-resistant acrylic or polycarbonate, or high security glass.  Another (although less attractive) alternative is to install a metal grill or bars outside the window or a scissors gate inside. Some gates have quick-release levers for emergency exits, but remember that a stationary grill renders a window useless as a fire exit.

Ask your security dealer about locks for windows, glass break detector alarms, window security alarms .

Technorati Tags: window security, glass break detectors, window security alarms, window locks