When Brett Fuchs stepped into his role as Director of Emergency Management at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, he brought more than just a traditional emergency planning mindset. With deep expertise in behavioral threat assessment and cross-departmental collaboration, Fuchs knew UTC needed more than just an incident response playbook—it needed a system that could help prevent emergencies before they unfolded.
That’s where VOLT AI came in.
Looking Beyond Policing
At many institutions, safety conversations start and stop with law enforcement. But for emergency managers, the scope is broader: health and safety compliance, facility vulnerabilities, critical infrastructure, accessibility issues, and student wellbeing.
Fuchs knew UTC had operational vulnerabilities, areas where risks weren’t being monitored in real time. These weren’t necessarily criminal threats, but they had the potential to create harm, lawsuits, or major service disruptions.
Using VOLT for Everyday Awareness
Fuchs and his team worked with public safety to deploy VOLT in targeted areas, looking specifically at how it could enhance the university’s emergency management capabilities.
Here’s how they’re using the system:
- ADA Entrances: A camera watching the only ADA-accessible entrance to the library now flags when someone loiters, signaling a possible elevator failure or someone in distress.
- Suicide Risk Monitoring: VOLT alerts on behavioral anomalies like someone climbing a garage railing. “We want to know before a student sees it and calls 911,” Fuchs said.
- Fall Detection: Whether it's a visitor, contractor, or staff member, VOLT has flagged multiple falls on campus, helping environmental health and safety (EHS) capture footage before it’s overwritten and speeding up insurance and compliance responses.
- Child Safety at Events: With frequent campus events involving families and children, VOLT’s ability to track movement and trace individuals backward in time is key when a child is reported missing.
- Remote Location Monitoring: At an off-campus observatory, where elderly visitors and student groups regularly gather, VOLT helps UTC ensure safety without needing on-site staff.
- Lone Worker Protection: For facilities like the 24/7 power plant, VOLT is being configured to detect whether employees check in on time or if someone may be unconscious and in need of help.
Cross-Departmental Impact
What stands out most in Fuchs’s approach is how he positioned VOLT not as a law enforcement tool, but as a campus-wide resource.
That broader awareness is transforming how UTC approaches prevention, planning, and accountability. Whether it's pulling video to confirm an incident, real-time flagging a fall risk, or detecting occupancy violations in secure areas, VOLT is helping Fuchs build a smarter safety culture.
A Preventative Mindset
For Fuchs, the biggest value in VOLT isn’t just the alerts—it’s the shift in thinking.
In higher education, where resources are tight and risks are wide-ranging, that kind of proactive technology is a force multiplier—not just for public safety, but for everyone tasked with keeping campus operations running smoothly and safely.
