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Student Safety and Asset Management Solutions in Education

Student Safety and Asset Management in Education are powered by Kontakt.io’s BLE end-to-end solution modules.

Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) is becoming a fundamental component in the relationship between education and technology. Kontakt.io is leveraging BLE to provide educational institutions with simple and effective solutions for improving the management of their assets and, most importantly, their student safety.

The symbiotic dance of education and technology has been accelerating in recent years. Technology brings new possibilities to the learning environment with the goal of higher-quality education for the greatest number of people. Education, in turn, produces scholars more capable than their predecessors at contributing to the workforce and taking care of the world.
From this text you will learn what asset tracking for education is and how to implement such a solution.

Securing students and assets with Bluetooth LE

When we hear about technology in education, it’s often in the context of tools for learning. Though there are other ingredients contributing to the overall learning environment that should not be overlooked. One such ingredient is safety.
Kontakt.io’s end-to-end solution modules, like the Safety and Security Module, are designed to enable a variety of applications for educational institutions.

Let’s take a closer look at student safety and asset management to better understand how Kontakt.io is delivering simple, effective IoT solutions in the education space.

Bluetooth LE Applications in Student Safety

It is the case that substantial responsibility lies with parents and educational institutions to mitigate the risk associated with kidnappings, assaults, and other forms of abuse targeted at their children or students.
One caveat worth mentioning is that there are a multitude of variables that impact one’s personal safety and a technology solution is far from being perfect. So we’re going to look at what is largely achievable through a BLE solution. Improvements in transparency and reaction time among others.

Leveraging our expertise in BLE location-based IoT solutions, Kontakt.io is creating safer, more secure academic environments.
Student Ridership, Access Control and Panic Button are three applications that the Kontakt.io Safety and Security Module delivers to solve these problems.

Student Ridership

Problem: A typical day for a K-12 student in the US involves riding a school bus from their neighborhood to their school and back. Sources indicate that as much as 31% of attempted abductions occur going to or from school. Parents or guardians are not always able to wait with their child or greet them upon returning.
Solution: A BLE solution would enable the student to be registered at a place and time whenever they come into contact with an access point (like a gateway or mobile phone) at the entrance to a bus or school. The BLE device (like a beacon) that the student would carry is unique and identifies them when they come within range of the access point.
Get a Student Tag today
Value added: If an abnormal event occurs (i.e. child gets off at wrong stop or boards the wrong bus) responsibles can be notified and contacted immediately to ensure the location of the student is known and redirected accordingly. Provides increased security and peace of mind.

Access Control

Problem: Once at school, students may wander out of the building or to an area they are not supposed to be in. Teachers are not always capable of monitoring every student at all times.
Solution: Using BLE to create virtual boundaries, or “geofencing”, administrators are able to prohibit access to certain students during certain times. Students shouldn’t be trying to exit the front door of school during math class, for example. An alert could be issued immediately to the teacher and parents via SMS.
Value added: Location is known and administrators notified when student enters restricted areas. This improves the reaction time to abnormal circumstances and adds transparency to students’ whereabouts.

Panic Button

Problem: Students, particularly those attending university, are put into various environments where their security is at risk and they may not have a simple means of signalling for help.
Solution: Kontakt.io’s Safety and Security Module provides a user-friendly panic button solution that can be deployed in a stationary or wearable model. Custom alerts can be created, rules set and historical data analyzed to improve conditions over time.
Using Kontakt.io’s Bluetooth panic button tags and gateways allows administrators to have instant location information in emergency situations on a dedicated dashboard. Students or teachers simply press the button on their tag to send an automated alert to predefined person.
discover the kontat.io panic button
Value added: Immediately pinpoints the student in need of help. Improves reaction time. Tracks incidents over-time to designate risk-prone areas and improve security.

Bluetooth LE Applications in Asset Management

Monitoring Building Systems

It may not come as a surprise to many to learn that commercial buildings in the United States waste 30% of the energy they use every year. Considering the mainstream usage of Air Conditioning in the US as compared to Europe, there are many reasons to look for solutions to curb unnecessary energy usage and wastage.
Problem: HVAC and lighting are the two biggest energy consumers in most commercial buildings. Improper maintenance and user behavior, like leaving the lights on or running the heater when no one is around, leads to wastage.
Solution: A dedicated Kontakt.io dashboard allows for the monitoring of multiple aspects of HVAC systems using wireless beacons and tags that track location, sensor data, and movement. 
Get the sensor-enabled beacon 
Value added: Improved asset utilization and cost cutting. The advantage of BLE over other technologies like WiFi tags, RFiD or UWB are that it’s simple and inexpensive.

Education Asset Tracking Solutions for Schools

School assets are regularly the victims of theft. Misplaced assets can also be cause for concern when calculating the time and money devoted to search and ordering replacements.
Problem: Items such as public tablets, laptops, books, lab, sport equipment or any other technology assets are often scattered across the facility or concentrated in different areas. Excess inventory drives up capital expenses and maintenance costs.
Solution: Kontakt.io School Asset Tracking Dashboard uses BLE sensors that track asset location and movement, and a dedicated dashboard for school administrators, enables school staff to locate the nearest available item instantly. Alerts sent when assets exit predefined zones. Achieved by real-time sensor monitoring via a BLE RTLS system, gateways, and cloud-based analytics.
Value added: Decrease the time spent looking for misplaced assets, reduce costs for buying missing assets, keep a real-time overview of all assets.

Working with Kontakt.io for Education Asset Tracking Solutions

In this post, we demonstrated how Kontakt.io is adding layers of safety to students and more effectively managing assets in the academic environment.
And the list of applications doesn’t end here.
Interacting with customers each day brings new use cases and new applications for BLE. Get in touch to discuss how we can work together to improve your school or institution. We are partnering with some of the best technology partners in the IoT space to deliver end-to-end solutions that solve real problems.
If you’re a pioneer in the education space, reach out to see how we can secure your next IoT project.

We recommend reading our blog regularly to learn more about education asset tracking solutions.