Meet the technology that is changing school security

A ski-masked, gun-brandishing robber had just held up his second cab driver in five hours on the morning of March 12 and was fleeing the scene of the crime, just blocks from Keyport High School. Borough police chief Butch Casaletto pulled out his cell phone and with two clicks an alert flashed on the smartphones of nearly every district employee: they were instructed to initiate lockdown procedures.

"I can say that this system was a great asset as the school was placed in lockdown by me when we realized that the threat was heading in the direction of the school," Casaletto said. No danger ever reached the school and the suspect was arrested later that night.

This system, Share911, can be found in hundreds of schools nationwide, including 79 buildings in Monmouth and Ocean counties. It was developed by OnScene Technologies Inc., a Ramsey, N.J.-based start-up led by Adrian Lanning, a developer who built the program, Ray Bailey, a former deputy police chief, and Erik Endress, a 30-year volunteer firefighter.

Share911, which Endress says has a patent pending, is a service sold to clients — almost entirely schools at this point, but they have plans to branch out commercially — that provides for two-way communication within an exclusive network, such as school staff, and first-responders.

Not only can any member of the network immediately put a school in lockdown, but they can tell each other during an evacuation that a child is missing or that an intruder just walked pass their door or that they are injured in a particular room. It's that type of interactivity that differentiates Share911 from reverse-911 technology and makes the rescue response more efficient, Endress said.

"What if the people inside the building could use their mobile device to say 'This is where I'm trapped' or 'This is where I'm injured' or 'This is where I saw the bad guy'?" he said of the questions they asked themselves during the product's development. "That would save a lot of time for police and firefighters to know where people are trapped or where the bad guy is."

This crisis communications technology "is rapidly gaining momentum," said Anthony Gentile, the CEO of the Center for Private Security and Safety at John Jay College of Criminal Justice who reworked Newton (Conn.) Public Schools security measures after the horrific Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting massacre in 2012.

"Awareness and response continue to be most concerning during an emergency and this product is most helpful in reducing that time line," he said.

Area school leaders are praising Share911 as a relatively low-cost and integral part of their security plan.

"Most of the stuff we do for security at schools ... is about delaying (intruders), delaying an event to minimize the damage that can occur before police can get there," said John Marciante, superintendent at Manalapan-Englishtown Regional Schools. "This is the first thing we can do that isn't focused on delaying an event from happening but on increasing the response speed."

"In a real life situation, you just feel so disconnected, not knowing what's going on," said EvaMarie Raleigh, superintendent of Beach Haven Schools. "(With Share911), our staff feels confident, relaxed, they're not frightened."

The service costs about $3 per school employee per month, meaning that a tiny district like Beach Haven pays less than $500 per year for the service, while the 5,000-student Manalapan-English district would spend nearly $25,000 annually.

The traditional paradigm allows only a few administrators the power to put a school in lockdown, while technology like Share911 works best if the first person — be it principal, teacher or custodian — who spots a danger can activate a lockdown.

Gentile says that wide degree of access can lead to false alarms and "anxious moments" for parents and staff, but Endress notes he can count on one hand the number of "accidental" activations. There haven't been any reports of unauthorized use — like a student grabbing a teacher's phone and starting a panic — and Endress said the website is as impenetrable to hackers "as your bank account."

Russ Zimmer: 732-557-5748, razimmer@app.com