Bangor schools have the same emergency alert system that authorities believe prevented further fatalities during a shooting at a Georgia high school last week.
Both Apalachee High School in Georgia and all Bangor schools have Centegix, an emergency alert system that allows school staff to call for first responders and police instantly in the case of an emergency. The system is designed to be simple, silent, fast and more exact than relying on someone to call 911 or use a phone app to report an emergency.
This is the first time Centegix has been publicly credited with saving the lives of students and staff during a mass shooting since Bangor schools installed the system last year. It’s also confirmation that it can make a difference in an unthinkable tragedy, which is why the school department adopted Centegix.
In the last academic year, it was activated in Bangor schools more than 100 times, according to Ray Phinney, a spokesperson for the department.
Staff members call for help by pressing a button on a wearable badge. Pressing the button three times alerts an in-school emergency team of a lower-level problem, such as a medical episode, mental health crisis or student conflict, Jeff Downs, a Centegix representative explained when Bangor schools launched the system last year. Law enforcement isn’t automatically called in this case.
If a staff member presses the button continuously until it beeps, it signals a larger crisis, such as an active shooter, and local law enforcement will automatically be notified. Lights in the school flash, every screen in the school shows an emergency notification, and the school intercom system plays an alert message telling students to lock down.
This is exactly what happened on Sept. 4 when a 14-year-old student entered Apalachee High School in Georgia and opened fire. Two teachers and two students were killed and nine others were wounded.
When the student began shooting, teachers pressed the emergency buttons, which locked down the school and instructed students to hide. The alert buttons also immediately called nearby first responders, who arrived minutes later and ended the attack.
Though the Georgia high school adopted the system a week before the attack, it’s among the factors authorities praised for preventing further casualties, the Washington Post reported.
“The protocols at this school and this system activated today prevented this from being a much larger tragedy,” Georgia Bureau of Investigation Director Chris Hosey said at a news conference last week, according to NBC News.
The Bangor School Department decided to adopt the Centegix system in the months after a lone gunman killed 19 children and two teachers at an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas, in May 2022, then-Bangor Superintendent James Tager told the Bangor Daily News last year.
Of the more than 100 activations in Bangor, 44 were drills and the remaining 67 times the system was used were “staff alerts,” Phinney said.
“Staff alerts” could mean a student was hurt on the playground, a teacher saw something suspicious, or a teacher needed help dealing with a student having a behavioral issue or physical altercation, Phinney said. The system can be especially helpful in those cases because it allows the staff member to remain focused on the situation while simultaneously and inconspicuously calling for help.
“The Bangor School Department has had a positive experience with Centegix, which has significantly enhanced our safety measures across the city,” Phinney said. “While we are deeply saddened to hear about the recent shootings in Georgia, we are grateful that the Centegix system worked effectively, helping to save the lives of countless students and staff.”
The system went live in all Bangor schools in January 2023. At the time, roughly 250 school districts nationwide had adopted the system, but Bangor was the first in New England. Since then, the Yarmouth School Department has adopted Centegix as well, Phinney said.
While Centegix can play a role in getting help where it’s needed quickly, Stacy Meyer, Centegix’s vice president of marketing, said the alert system works best when used in partnership with drills to teach students what to do in an emergency.
“Routine training to build muscle memory of what to do in an emergency is absolutely necessary to bring the people and the technology together,” Meyer said.
