A Higher Degree Of Protection For Schools: IP Video Surveillance

Schools and colleges should be safe havens for education. Unfortunately, like every other part of society, they suffer their share of crime and violence. News events like the shootings at Columbine High School and Virginia Tech, and local school crimes in many communities, have parents, students, teachers and administrators looking for an extra degree of security. For colleges, it is a category in which they are rated and compared by prospective students and parents.

Providing physical protection can be difficult and expensive throughout a school system or college campus. Preferring to devote their budget to enhancing education rather than security, most educators look for maximum value in every security purchase. Two important components contributing to this value are the ability to help prevent crime and help maintain a low-crime record. Since video surveillance systems help deter crime by signaling people that they're being watched and evidence is being collected against them, they are of high interest to educators.

This paper will introduce administrators and school security managers to IP (networked) video surveillance systems. It explains how these systems improve the quality of video surveillance, providing many advantages over analog video systems, while at the same time being more cost effective for tight school budgets.