Decision Support for Campus Emergency Response Management

The history of university, college, and high school campuses is eventful with man-made tragedies ensuing a tremendous loss of life and property. Virginia Tech's April 16 tragedy ignited the discussion about balancing openness and safety in open campus environments. Decision makers in educational institutions face the challenge of ensuring that their campuses provide an open learning environment and at the same time are safe. Most deployed technology solutions are characterized by addressing bits and pieces of the problem (e.g. electronic notification systems). Without a comprehensive understanding of the requirements for an institution-wide solution that facilitates augmented situational awareness and efficient emergency response, the proposed solutions fall short of the desired outcome. This paper provides a capabilities specification for such a solution. The capabilities specification serves as a case study and a framework that guide the architecting, design, and implementation of decision support systems that facilitate campus emergency response management.