Kelechi M. Ikegwu – Evelyn Sowells – Howard Hardiman
Department of Computer Systems Technology, North Carolina A&T State University
ABSTRACT. The horrific and tragic deaths that have resulted from infamous school shootings have deprived Americans of the sense of security in what has traditionally been a nurturing and safe environment. This paper will discuss different preventive methods for school shootings. The most current preventive methods are examined for fitness based on a variety of school shootings that have occurred in the past. Then a framework for a new school shooting protection device is proposed and evaluated. Concepts from computer vision, anomaly detection, and electromagnetic propulsion are discussed with respect to the proposed framework. Ideally, the goal of the framework presented in this paper is to prevent deaths and injuries from occurring during a school shooting. With the framework, an efficient and comparatively affordable preventive method could be released in the near future.
The federal requirement for a school safety plan is outlined in the Jeanne Clery Disclosure of Campus Security Policy and Campus Crime Statistics Act, commonly known as the Clery Act. The Clery Act requires all colleges and universities that participate in federal student financial aid programs to develop and publish an annual security report that includes certain safety-related policies, procedures, and crime statistics.
The Clery Act requires that schools include specific information in their security reports, including:
The school’s crime statistics for the previous three years.
Information about the school’s policies and procedures related to campus safety and security.
Information about crime prevention programs and services offered by the school.
Information about the school’s emergency response and evacuation procedures.
Information about the school’s policies and procedures for addressing and reporting incidents of sexual assault, domestic violence, dating violence, and stalking.
Information about the school’s drug and alcohol policies and prevention programs.
While the Clery Act only applies to colleges and universities that receive federal student financial aid, many states and school districts have adopted similar requirements for K-12 schools to develop and implement comprehensive safety plans. These plans may include many of the same elements as Clery Act-compliant security reports, such as emergency response protocols, crime prevention programs, and policies for addressing incidents of violence and harassment.
The most recent changes to the Clery Act were made in March 2020, when the Department of Education published the final rule amending the Clery Act regulations. The changes include:
Expanding the definition of sexual harassment to include quid pro quo and hostile environment harassment, which aligns with Title IX regulations.
Requiring institutions to report stalking and domestic violence in addition to existing crime categories.
Adding hazing as a reportable crime category.
Requiring institutions to compile and publish hate crime statistics for all categories of prejudice, including gender identity and national origin.
Requiring institutions to include specific policies and procedures in their annual security reports, such as those related to prevention and response to sexual assault, domestic violence, dating violence, and stalking.
Requiring institutions to provide survivor-centered and trauma-informed services to individuals who report or experience sexual assault, domestic violence, dating violence, or stalking.
Requiring institutions to include information about prevention and response to cyberbullying and electronic harassment in their annual security reports.
Allowing institutions to provide annual security reports electronically and requiring institutions to make their crime statistics publicly available on their website.
These changes aim to strengthen the Clery Act’s requirements for campus safety and to better address sexual harassment and other forms of violence on college and university campuses.
Every new federal law involving paperwork creates an uncountable number of trade associations and compliance enterprises. A simple web search on “Cleary Act” will reveal half the internet full of pages for more information. Our focus is on the user-side — i.e. making inquiries and pushing back on the gaudy proliferation of regulatory requirements, the integrity of purpose of the law notwithstanding. We maintain this title on the standing agenda on all of our Security colloquia. See our CALENDAR for the next online meeting; open to everyone.
The original University of Michigan standards advocacy enterprise (see ABOUT) began following the evolution of NFPA 730 and NFPA 731 since the 2008 Edition. That enterprise began a collaboration with trade associations and subject matter experts from other universities (notably Georgetown University and Evergreen State University) to advocate user-interest concepts in the 2011 edition. A summary of advocacy action is summarized in the links below:
in the appeared in a trade association journal Facilities Manager:
An online presentation by Michael C. Peele (Georgetown University) — one of the voting members of NFPA 730 and NFPA 731 technical committees– was recorded and is linked below.
Public comment on the First Draft of the 2026 Edition will be received until January 3, 2025. You may key in your own ideas by clicking in to our user-interest Public Consultation Meeting Point or by communicating directly with the NFPA.
This title remains on the standing agenda of our Security colloquia. See our CALENDAR for the next online meeting; open to everyone.
“It is impolite to make fun of other people’s religion.
If you cannot persuade a population to buy into your oligarchic ambitions
then turn those ambitions into a religion.”
— Michael A. Anthony, P.E.
University of Michigan, ’83 and ’88 (Retired)
A conversation with Bjorn Lomborg, a visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution, the president of the Copenhagen Consensus Center, and one of the foremost climate experts in the world today. His new book — “False Alarm: How Climate Change Panic Costs Us Trillions, Hurts the Poor, and Fails to Fix the Planet” — is an argument for treating climate as a serious problem but not an extinction-level event requiring such severe and drastic steps as rewiring a large part of the culture and the economy.
The alarmist reddening of weather maps is a perfect visualisation of how 5th generational warfare works. We’re dealing with an information war and the battlefield is our mind. @RWMaloneMDpic.twitter.com/nTBv5yhYbS
Apollo – Helios Driving The Chariot Of The Sun, 1517-18
“DIFFER” is a research institute domiciled at TU/e that is focused on advancing the development of sustainable energy technologies, such as fusion energy and solar fuels. It conducts fundamental research on plasma physics and materials science to understand the behavior of matter at extremely high temperatures and under extreme conditions.
DIFFER also collaborates with universities, research institutions, and industry partners to translate their research into practical applications. The institute’s ultimate goal is to develop new and innovative solutions to meet the world’s growing demand for energy while reducing greenhouse gas emissions and environmental impact.
Among its findings and recommendations: “Electrochemical Production of Ammonia from Renewable Energy: A Thermodynamic Analysis” published in the Journal of The Electrochemical Society in 2018, which evaluated the thermodynamic feasibility of using renewable energy to produce ammonia, an important fertilizer, through electrochemical processes.
N.B. Ammonia can be deployed for energy conservation purposes in various ways, such as:
Energy storage: Ammonia can be used as a means of storing energy from renewable sources, such as wind and solar power, in the form of chemical energy. This stored energy can be released by converting ammonia back into electricity through fuel cells or by burning it in a combustion engine.
Power generation: Ammonia can be used directly as a fuel in combustion engines or turbines to generate electricity, without emitting greenhouse gases or other harmful pollutants.
Heating and cooling: Ammonia can be used as a refrigerant or heat transfer fluid in industrial processes, air conditioning systems, or district heating networks, reducing the energy required for cooling and heating.
Fuel for transportation: Ammonia can be used as a fuel for ships, trains, or other heavy-duty vehicles, reducing emissions of greenhouse gases and other pollutants.
However, it is worth noting that the deployment of ammonia for energy conservation purposes requires the development of suitable technologies for its production, transportation, and storage, as well as the necessary infrastructure to support its use.
Today we run a status check on the stream of technical and management standards evolving to assure the highest possible level of security for education communities. The literature expands significantly from an assortment of national standards-setting bodies, trade associations, ad hoc consortia and open source standards developers. CLICK HERE for a sample of our work in this domain.
School security is big business in the United States. A few years ago we could deal with physical security separately from cybersecurity. Not so much anymore. In today’s colloquium — essentially a survey module presenting a broad overview — we seek to understand product and interoperability standards for the following technologies:
Video surveillance: indoor and outdoor cameras, cameras with night vision and motion detection capabilities and cameras that can be integrated with other security systems for enhanced monitoring and control.
Access control:doors, remote locking, privacy and considerations for persons with disabilities.
As time permits, we will reckon with first cost and long-term maintenance cost, including software maintenance.
According to a report by Markets and Markets, the global school and campus security market size was valued at USD 14.0 billion in 2019 and is projected to reach USD 21.7 billion by 2025, at a combined annual growth rate of 7.2% during the forecast period. Another report by Research And Markets estimates that the US school security market will grow at a compound annual growth rate of around 8% between 2020 and 2025, driven by factors such as increasing incidents of school violence, rising demand for access control and surveillance systems, and increasing government funding for school safety initiatives.
Noteworthy: The combined annual growth rate of the school and campus security market is greater than the growth rate of the education “industry” itself.
Education Community Safety catalog is one of the fast-growing catalogs of best practice literature. We link a small sample below and update ahead of every Security colloquium.
When your students love the school security guard- he gets flowers! Thanks, Steve! You are the BEST and we appreciate your hard work keeping us safe and building relationships! pic.twitter.com/VCJQ6y9S44
Energy 400: Codes and standards for energy systems between campus buildings. (District energy systems including interdependence with electrical and water supply)
A different “flavor of money” runs through each of these domains and this condition is reflected in best practice discovery and promulgation. Energy 200 is less informed by tax-free (bonded) money than Energy 400 titles.
There are other ad hoc and open-source consortia that occupy at least a niche in this domain. All of the fifty United States and the Washington DC-based US Federal Government throw off public consultations routinely and, of course, a great deal of faculty interest lies in research funding.
Please join our daily colloquia using the login credentials at the upper right of our home page. We are also rolling out another facility — [MEETING POINT] — which should be ready for use sometime mid-2023.
During today’s session we approach disaster avoidance, management and recovery literature from a different point of view than our customary approach — i.e. what happens when, a) there is failure to conform to the standard, b) there is no applicable standard at all. This approach necessarily requires venturing into the regulatory and legal domains. We will confine our approach to the following standards development regimes:
De facto standards: These are standards that are not officially recognized or endorsed by any formal organization or government entity, but have become widely adopted by industry or through market forces. Examples include the QWERTY keyboard layout and the MP3 audio format.
De jure standards: These are standards that are formally recognized and endorsed by a government or standard-setting organization. Examples include the ISO 9000 quality management standard and the IEEE 802.11 wireless networking standard.
Consortium standards: These are standards that are developed and maintained by a group of industry stakeholders or organizations, often with the goal of advancing a particular technology or product. Examples include the USB and Bluetooth standards, which are maintained by the USB Implementers Forum and the Bluetooth Special Interest Group, respectively.
Open standards: These are standards that are freely available and can be used, implemented, and modified by anyone without restriction. Examples include the HTML web markup language and the Linux operating system.
Proprietary standards: These are standards that are owned and controlled by a single organization, and may require payment of licensing fees or other restrictions for use or implementation. Examples include the Microsoft Office document format and the Adobe PDF document format.
ANSI accredited standards developers with disaster management catalogs
We may have time to review State of Emergency laws on the books of most government agencies; with special attention to power blackout disasters.
Cases involving the Takings Clause of the Fifth Amendment might be relevant when government actions related to natural disasters affect private property rights.
Abstract: Open kitchen design is becoming popular in small units in high-rise residential buildings. This design increases the possibility that fires originating in the cooking area would spread beyond its origin. Effect of cabinet properties and wind on the fire hazards of open kitchen is numerically studied. It is found that if there are combustible items adjacent to the cooking area it helps the fire to spread giving a big fire and the wind may cause the fire spread vertically along the building exterior wall.
New update alert! The 2022 update to the Trademark Assignment Dataset is now available online. Find 1.29 million trademark assignments, involving 2.28 million unique trademark properties issued by the USPTO between March 1952 and January 2023: https://t.co/njrDAbSpwBpic.twitter.com/GkAXrHoQ9T
![How easy it is to make people believe a lie, and [how] hard it is to undo that work again! - Mark Twain](https://www.azquotes.com/vangogh-image-quotes/48/62/Quotation-Mark-Twain-It-s-easier-to-fool-people-than-to-convince-them-48-62-03.jpg)
