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In: *Connecting the Dots Blog*, Success

Although this interview was conducted before the recent tragedy in Oregon, this is great example of a community college working hard to improve student safety and prevention efforts ongoing. Rick spoke with George Okaty, Safety and Security Manager of Tidewater Community College. Okaty is a true leader who is dedicated to helping his staff become more efficient and keeping their campus safe. Tidewater Community College is using Awareity’s TIPS platform to provide all security officers a secure way to submit and keep track of all safety incidents on campus. The college will also be expanding use of the platform in the next few months toRead More →

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In: *Connecting the Dots Blog*, Success

Rick also recently sat down with Amanda Agguire, former state senator and CEO and Founder of the Regional Center for Border Health (RCBH). Agguire helped create the Yuma County Anti‐Bullying Task Force in 2008 in an effort to raise awareness regarding such a sensitive and difficult issue in rural Yuma County, Arizona. Through the use of Awareity’s TIPS, the Community Action Group is encouraging students, parents, staff, and community members to report incidents of bullying, threats of violence, weapons, drugs/alcohol, vandalism, sexting, suicide and other risks. Proper personnel from the school district selected, as well as counselors from RCBH and appropriate city/county law enforcement, areRead More →

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Rick and Jason received great feedback from their ASIS pre-conference program that was part of the “Developing a School Security and Safety Plan for the Next Five Years,” sponsored by the ASIS International School Safety and Security Council. Experts discussed topics including risk assessments, active shooter programs, emergency planning, access control, and how technology can be leveraged to create safer school environments. Their presentation focused on how school professionals and communities can work together to “connect the dots”, looking for indicators that can be utilized to proactively prevent a future tragedy. Rick Shaw, CEO and founder of Awareity, used the investigative report from Sandy HookRead More →

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In: *Connecting the Dots Blog*

Are you attending ASIS 2015 in Anaheim this year? Are you concerned about Student Safety? Social media seems to be a big challenge for every school, as well as violence, sexual misconduct, depression, bullying and numerous other incidents that can make your school’s learning environment difficult for everyone. Administrators know the gaps can get you, so how do you eliminate these potential risks and liabilities? Students, faculty, staff, parents and community members all know things you don’t… You can maximize your ROI and ROP (Return on Prevention) by attending one of the intensive pre-session programs on Sunday, September 27th. Awareity’s founder and CEO Rick Shaw,Read More →

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In: *Connecting the Dots Blog*

In light of the horrible tragedy in Virginia where a television reporter and cameraman from WDBJ-TV were shot and killed by a former colleague during a live report on tourism, it is time to take a deeper look at the data and what can be done to prevent workplace violence related incidents and tragedies. Of course everyone agrees PREVENTING is BETTER than REACTING…so if everyone prefers PREVENTING, why are organizations seemingly in continuous REACTION MODE? Connecting the dots… My “return on prevention” experiences go all the way back to 6th grade and my professional experiences include 30+ years doing assessments (threat, risk, cyber security, physicalRead More →

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In: *Connecting the Dots Blog*

In case you needed more reasons to continuously improve your organization’s information security awareness, does $1 BILLION lost to hackers since October 2013 get your attention? According to the FBI, corporate account takeover and business email fraud have resulted in $1 billion dollars lost since October 2013…and some of these losses have caused organizations to go out of business. http://www.wsj.com/articles/hackers-trick-email-systems-into-wiring-them-large-sums-1438209816 Spear phishing and phishing attacks trick people into clicking on a website link or opening an attached file which plants malware inside their network. These attacks are targeting people in your organization and/or people working at your third party service providers. Once the hackers haveRead More →

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In: Success

Southeast Community College (SCC) has launched Awareity’s anonymous reporting and prevention platform, TIPS (Threat Assessment, Incident Management and Prevention Services), allowing the campus community to confidentially report potentially harmful incidents, accidents or concerning behaviors and ensuring the appropriate campus personnel take immediate action. If someone is aware of conditions that adversely affect an SCC campus or has information warranting concern for the safety of students, faculty or staff, they can now easily access the TIPS REPORT INCIDENT button from SCC’s website. SCC encourages students and staff to report all types of information, whether it is an off-handed remark made by a student in class, aRead More →

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In: *Connecting the Dots Blog*

Cyber Attacks are on the rise and they are creating big problems and big expenses for organizations of all sizes and across most sectors. Organizations being hacked include some of the most recognized in their respective sector including the US Office of Personnel Management (OPM), the White House, Anthem, UCLA Health, JP Morgan, Target, Staples and a long list of others. Question: Would you rather PREVENT cyber attackers from penetrating your organization or would you rather REACT to cyber attackers inside your organization? Answer: PREVENT (by the way…everyone agrees preventing is better than reacting) Yet, with all of the lessons learned from hundreds of cyberattacks…mostRead More →

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In: *Connecting the Dots Blog*

What you don’t know about your Student Records System and FERPA…could cost you dearly! (and many others too!) CREATING MORE LIABILITIES is not exactly a “top priority” for most Administrators and Board members, but creating more liabilities is exactly what their Student Records System and their lack of awareness of FERPA could be doing. As I speak at K-12 and Higher Education conferences all across the nation, it is shocking how many Administrators, faculty and staff (TATs, BITs, counselors, SROs, nurses, coaches, etc.) are unaware of the section of FERPA that describes “law enforcement unit records and a law enforcement unit”. To understand how thisRead More →

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In: *Connecting the Dots Blog*

As mentioned in Part 5 of this blog series, there are 6 Essential Steps to Proactive Prevention, Awareness is step 1, Collecting the Dots is step 2, Assessing the Dots is step 3 and Connecting the Dots is step 4. Step 5 is Intervention & Monitoring and Step 6 is Preventing & Monitoring. What does Intervention and Prevention and Monitoring involve? Collaboration in creating an intervention plan, 100% cooperation across organizations to implement the intervention plan, continuously monitoring behaviors to see if intervention plan is working, continuously monitoring situation to determine if risk levels / individuals are escalating or de-escalating based on latest information, immediateRead More →