By Forum Staff
Mayor Eric Adams on Monday announced the nation’s first pilot directly integrating public schools with 911 services for life-saving rapid response in case of an active shooter situation.
The new Emergency Alert System, created by the City Office of Technology and Innovation, debuted at the Spring Creek campus in Brooklyn—the first school building in the United States to have direct 911 integration—and is scheduled to be rolled out to a total of 25 school buildings, representing 51 public schools across the five boroughs during the 2025-2026 school year. EAS provides an immediate, secure, and automated pathway for public schools to directly alert 911 of a critical emergency associated with a hard lockdown involving a weapon-based threat or active shooter situation, according to the administration.
Adams noted that EAS can be activated from multiple fixed buttons and wireless lanyards within a school and can initiate a 911 response in under 10 seconds. This school year, the pilot will roll out to 51 schools located at 25 school buildings, allowing for five sites per borough. Each school participating in the pilot will have multiple fixed buttons and wireless lanyards that can activate the emergency system during a hard lockdown sparked by a weapon-based threat.
The school-activated EAS bypasses the 911 call flow straight to real-time dispatch. Within a matter of seconds, the dispatcher will put the call over the air and the system’s dashboard will provide emergency responders pertinent information on the school. Simultaneously, in these situations, the schools will have audible and visual indicators notifying students and faculty that 911 has been notified, and the school is on a hard lockdown. Additionally, electronic notifications will be sent to NYPD School Safety and City public schools officials.
In late 2023, OTI’s Public Safety and Emergency Management division started working with the Mayor’s Office, Department of Education, and NYPD’s School Safety Division to research options for a school-based panic button with direct connectivity to 911 in response to active-shooter scenarios, as no such product existed on the market at the time. The available emergency alert options transferred calls through a remote system in another state before subsequently routing them back to New York City. OTI worked with an external vendor to build a new EAS that meets the needs of NYC public schools, then rebuilt and tested the system within its internal lab to confirm its effectiveness. OTI also created dashboards that provide law enforcement and school officials with real-time insights in the event of an active shooter situation.
More than 1,900 K-12 school shooting incidents occurred in the U.S. between 2015 and September 2025, according to the K-12 School Shooting Database. K-12 school shootings peaked at 351 in 2023 and another 336 occurred in 2024.
“Public safety is the prerequisite to prosperity and the key to delivering for working-class families, because our students deserve to feel safe in school, our parents must know their children are in a secure environment, and our teachers should have the confidence to focus on shaping young minds,” said Adams.
