Overview: The William Alvord Unified School District

The Alvord Unified School District (AUSD) in Riverside, CA includes 14 elementary schools, four middle schools, three high schools, and two continuation schools. The district employs more than 2,000 teachers and staff and is responsible for educating more than 18,000 students.

In addition, AUSD maintains a state-of-the-art Emergency Response Operations Center (EOC) that incorporates a sophisticated network of closed-circuit cameras and two-way radios to monitor and establish instant communication throughout every corner of each campus and classroom throughout the district.

The EOC is responsible for overseeing strategic directions and operational decisions for the entire district, while also protecting life and property during crisis situations, and maintaining communication with all the campuses and first responder agencies.

Challenge: Building a State-of-the-Art Communications System

Bob Turner assumed the role of AUSD’s Director of Risk & Emergency Management in 2014, and immediately saw the school district’s communications system was inadequate to address any crisis or emergency whether an active shooter, abnormal traffic patterns, or regional earthquakes. As a highly trained electronic communications professional with both a bachelor’s and master’s degree in Emergency and Disaster Management and Technical Communications, Bob knew the key piece to building a sophisticated communications system must include professional quality two-way radios. While the school district already had two-way radios, they were not powerful enough to send and receive transmissions throughout the diverse campus environment. In addition, upon inspection, Bob noticed the radios were programmed incorrectly which prevented them from talking to each other, and they were all narrow band VHF radios which couldn’t penetrate walls, steel, or glass.

“Unfortunately, the district allowed vendors to come in and dictate what they wanted to sell and how the school district should use it. The frequencies were all over the place and people were ordering their own things, and the vendor was selling them whatever they could. I stepped in and said ‘OK…I’m taking over,’” said Bob.

The Solution: RCA’s Free Demo Program Showcases Equipment, Infrastructure and Service

As the new Director of Risk & Emergency Management, Bob wanted to replace, upgrade, and re-design the school’s entire two-way radio system. Specifically, he wanted radios with digital UHF signals and that could cross-link so that all the campuses and individual classrooms throughout the district would be able to communicate with each other.

He contacted Discount Two-Way Radio (DTWR) and explained his predicament. Our phone-based account executives immediately understood his dilemma and recommended that AUSD take advantage of RCA Communications Systems Free Two-Way Radio Demo Program. This Program allows qualified clients to test RCA’s two-way radios at no cost.Discount Two-Way Radio sent the Alvord Unified School District several sample radios to experience the quality of the radio equipment and DTWR’s VIP customer support. After just a couple days, Bob ordered a new supply of RCA two-way radios for the entire school district.

The Solution: Immediate Communication Improvement with the RCA RDR2500 Series

Based on the requirements the school needed, we recommended the RCA RDR2500 series of digital two-way radios at prices that were 30 percent lower than what they were paying. In addition, like all our VIP customers, we guaranteed the district expedited warranty, service, and repair, and the following benefits:

• Best price and most durable radio for any school district

• Longest and most comprehensive warranty in the industry

• Dedicated “no-hold” telephone support team

• Free Tune and Align and full diagnostics during summer months

• Immediate nationwide shipping

• Complete two-way radio concierge service

The Results: Immediate Communications Improvement at Half the Cost

After seeing how well RCA two-way radios worked, experiencing our VIP concierge customer service that included expedited warranty, service and repairs, and recognizing that RCA radios are one-third the price of Motorola radios, the school district completely replaced their existing radios for RCA. Bob incorporated the RCA two-way radios into his new Emergency Operations Center and quickly brought superior tactical communications to the entire district.

“The improvement with the new two-way radios was immediate, and the quality is exceptional. Now we have radios throughout every school and district office. Discount Two-Way Radio always has the right stuff in stock, and we get it the next day. Everybody has been awesome and very knowledgeable, and the demo program was great. It really made a big difference for our school district,” said Bob

To see how Discount Two-Way Radio can help improve your school’s radio communications, give us a call today at 800-895-5122.