In an effort to further improve the safety of Chagrin Falls Exempted Village Schools, while also helping to ensure compliance with Ohio’s school safety plan statute, the district is using an innovative emergency response safety system known as NaviGate Prepared.
NaviGate Prepared was developed by Ohio-based Lauren Innovations specifically for K-12 schools and uses cloud-based technology to better prepare and assist school officials and first responders before, during and after a crisis.
It securely organizes emergency preparedness plans and associated information, such as call lists, building maps, color-coded floor plans and interactive photographs/maps of important building areas, like emergency resources, hallways and rooms. First responders and school officials have immediate, real-time access around-the-clock to this safety information from any Web-authorized device.
“The advantages of NaviGate Prepared software has helped our team to improve school safety by coordinating and synthesizing all of our important safety information in one secure location. The system is a “best practice” tool compliant with state and national recommendations from Ohio Homeland Security, FEMA, and the Ohio Department of Education,” said Chris Woofter, Director of Operations, Chagrin Falls Exempted Village Schools. “The access to the system by local safety forces, dispatch centers, and school officials means that we are all connected to the same high quality-information in the event of an emergency.”
In an emergency situation, NaviGate Prepared includes the ability to integrate floor plans and reunification procedures, tap into live security camera feeds and quickly locate key resources, such as gas, water and electrical shut-off valves, entrances and exits, designated evacuation sites, individual classroom numbers and more.
In addition to heightening school safety, the system has supported school administrators with organization and submission of the four required components of Ohio’s school safety plan statute, by the Ohio Department of Education. Chagrin Falls Schools are not only in compliance with the law, but ahead of the curve on best practices in school preparedness. The statute includes submission of a school safety plan, floor plans that are unique to each building floor, site plans of buildings and surrounding properties and emergency contact information sheets.
In relation to the school safety plan requirement, regarding floor plans, site plans, and emergency contact sheets, the system offers detailed, color-coded floor plans of each building floor. As required, floor plans allow for labeling and numbering and include compass directions, exterior alpha phonetic identification of building sides and an accompanying key/legend. The system’s mobile/building mapping features provide aerial depictions of Chagrin Falls Schools’ buildings and surrounding properties, including parking lots, athletic fields, playgrounds and street names.
In addition to the four-part emergency management plan, annual review of emergency training drills is also an Ohio requirement and is handled by the district through the drill logging feature, which manages and tracks annual safety drills.
The NaviGate mobile Flip Chart mobile app allows instant access to emergency and crisis plans for use during training drills and emergencies. It is a practical tool and is used and available to the district’s administrators, teachers and staff anytime – with or without Internet connection.
“The Flip Chart mobile app has allowed our teaching staff to be directly and quickly connected to summary versions of our Emergency Operations Plan, providing easy and quick access to safety information for drills and safety planning,” said Woofter.
NaviGate Prepared system has been SAFETY Act Designated as an anti-terrorism-level technology by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. “Chagrin Falls Schools has found this system to be an excellent value and useful as we continue to develop better overall safety and security practices for our community,” said Woofter.
