What is Alyssa's Law?
5 Best Practices for Implementing Alyssa's Law
1. Have Multiple Origination Points
Some states that have implemented Alyssa’s Law require only one silent panic button per school. This is a good start, but since there is no way to predict where trouble will arise, it’s better to have them in multiple locations. We suggest placing a panic button in every classroom. This could greatly decrease the time it takes to alert authorities in an emergency.
2. Be Seen, Not Heard
Alyssa's Law calls for silent panic alarms in order to minimize escalation of a stressful situation. What a silent alarm alone cannot do is alert on-site security personnel and staff when an emergency is in progress. Visual notification devices such as the VL520-F LED sign with integrated flashers placed in the main office can display a message to give the exact location of the panic button that was pushed. This information can be used to quickly deploy resources to that area, or to divert traffic from it. Valcom systems can also send pop-up messages directly to any computer attached to your school’s network. This can alert staff or faculty of an incident real-time, without the disruption of an audible alarm. Additionally, consider implementing a system that can provide district-level visibility of emergency events, like Valcom VEMASS.
3. Provide Detailed Information
Some states mandate a direct two-way open phone conversation with authorities when a panic button is pushed. Others require a repeating, recorded message. Regardless of which your state requires, providing detailed information to authorities is critical to ensure that they can respond to the specific location where help is needed. Be sure that your alerting system can send caller ID, or even more granular information like classroom numbers to your designated authorities in an emergency event.
4. Send a Clear Message
If your state mandates a repeating, recorded message, we suggest using a text-to-speech engine to ensure that what authorities hear is a stressless voice in a very stressful situation. Text-to-speech messages are always consistent, and be modified much easier than re-recording a human voice.
5. Choose Experience
When it's time to implement Alyssa’s Law in your school, Valcom has a proven track record as we've helped over 45,000 schools implement alerting and notifications solutions to keep students safe, informed and on schedule. Contact us directly to learn how we can help your school become Alyssa's Law compliant,
Resources
To learn more about Alyssa's Law or where you state stands with implementing the law, please review the resources below.