While it at first seemed artificial intelligence and school wouldn‘t mix well, as students could use it to cheat on assignments, school districts have recently found a better use for the technology that could increase safety.
In Louisiana’s Iberville Parish, the school district has found new ways to protect students and staff, partnering with ZeroEyes’s gun detection artificial intelligence software.
The software will be installed into the district’s existing cameras, helping protect from potential threats, the district’s superintendent, Louis Voiron, told Fox News.
“There’s no way with us having 800 cameras in our school district that one or two people can see what’s happening on every single camera in the district,” Voiron said.
With a history of violence in the area, Voiron said that the district’s top priority is to keep those at school safe and that getting the system installed, which should be done in January, will do just that.
“Unfortunately, in our area, we have had a couple shootings that have occurred on school campuses and near school campuses. And we took the approach to being more proactive,” Voiron said.
Here’s how the system works.
ZeroEyes co-founder Sam Alaimo said that the software spots possible firearms and alerts the company’s analytical team, which, like the rest of the company, is made up of former law enforcement and military members.
“The algorithm says, ‘Hey, I think it’s a gun.’ It sends a still-frame image to our operating center. Our analyst looks at it and says if it is a gun, ‘I am going to dispatch it,’” Alaimo said.
Analysts then alert school staff and local police, telling them where the gun was detected and its location. The team is also prepared to handle false alarms when the AI gets it wrong, Alaimo said.
“If we can tell very obviously it’s not a genuine threat, we do not dispatch the client. We’ll just give them a friendly phone call or an email saying, hey, you want to be aware of a child with a Nerf gun that looks very much like the real thing is over here, you might want to take care of that,” Alaimo said.
Currently, the software is installed in more than 100 schools across 35 states.