Why is TAA-compliant technology important in the public sector?

Interactive display being used in the public sector

Published: September 27th, 2024

In 1979, the Trade Agreements Act (TAA) was signed to govern trade agreements between the United States and other countries. The United States government requires TAA compliance for products and services it purchases to promote fair and open international trade.

To be considered TAA compliant, a product or service must be manufactured or substantially transformed in a designated country. Organizations in the public sector, including public education, government, law enforcement, military, and healthcare, are motivated by providing services to the public at a reasonable cost and can greatly benefit from TAA-compliant technology.

Public sector vs. private sector

Unlike organizations in the private sector, which make a profit from a product or service, the public sector relies on taxpayers, volunteers, and donations, and plays a critical role in our society and communities.

These organizations provide essential goods and services including public transit, defense agencies, healthcare and public education. The public sector also plays an important role in economic growth through infrastructure innovation and development, creating job opportunities.

How do interactive displays benefit the public sector?

Interactive flat panel displays (IFPDs) help keep a community connected and updated with the latest technology. It’s important to have easy ways to increase productivity in public sector workplaces. Whether employees are in the office, at home, on the road, in the lab, or on base, IFPDs can be used to boost engagement and teamwork in a variety of industries.

Public education

Schools and districts around the globe use and benefit from IFPDs, from K-12 to higher education. A recent McKinsey report identified eight domains in which transformational edtech intersects with teaching and learning:

  1. Connectivity and community building
  2. Group work
  3. Classroom interactions
  4. Machine learning-powered teaching assistants
  5. AI adaptive course delivery
  6. Classroom exercises
  7. Augmented/virtual reality
  8. Student progress monitoring

IFPDs are particularly helpful with classroom interaction, collaboration, group work, augmented simulations, and administrative tasks for educators and IT staff.

Government

Interactive panels can be used for managing and coordinating large multi-agency events where a single overall command unit is used, either from a command hub, or in an on-site mobile command vehicle equipped with IFPDs.

Law enforcement

In addition to whiteboarding, conferencing, and planning functions, IFPDs can clearly display large-scale events and incidents that require policing. One example is policing of festivals or marches. Maps of the area or route can be displayed on one or more panels in a central control room or command vehicle, and combined with real-life video at specific stages, move throughout the area on bodycams or via police drone footage.

The interactive functionality allows for notetaking and planning directly on the maps in response to the developing situation. IFPDs can also be used to replace traditional evidence or ink boards in ongoing investigations.

Military

IFPDs are ideal for situational analysis and monitoring in a similar way to fire and emergency. Typical examples would include tactical planning and simulation wargaming with the use of bodycams linked to direct feeds incorporated into maps, and operational planning incorporating sensor feed for modern land, air, and sea operations.

Healthcare/emergency services

IFPDs can be used to clearly display emergency monitoring and analysis in real time (like chemical spills and forest fires) based on geographic and meteorological data. In the case of an oil spill, current meteorological and maritime maps can be displayed on the panel, and the emergency team can plot the spread of the toxic material dependent on water currents, delta layout, and coastal features.

Historically, firefighters have used physical tag boards to log their entry and exit from a disaster area. Panels can be used for real-time personnel tracking on-site, with the added benefit of incorporating live bodycam feeds and consistent monitoring.

Four benefits TAA-compliant interactive displays bring to the public sector

Interactive displays not only benefit non-profit and government environments, but also support hybrid work, design, simulation, data capture, process management, and real-time planning and monitoring.

IFPDs have easy interfaces that work with the technology and software organizations already use and create more efficient systems that prioritize speed, action, and security. An IFPD can help any public sector organization:

  1. Streamline processes and speed up decisions: Easy-to-use interfaces work with the technology and software organizations across the public sector already use to create more efficient systems.
  2. Communicate and collaborate across locations: Connect staff members whether they’re in the office, in the field, or at home, and facilitate easy collaboration with whiteboarding, screen sharing, and document sharing.
  3. Train, educate, and onboard staff members: Create engaging, effective training courses and onboarding presentations that guarantee employees get the same information in a consistent way.
  4. Ensure information is safe and secure: Organizational and personal data and information is safe and secure, no matter when, how, or where the panel is used.

The simplest way to incorporate IFPDs into the public sector environment is to use them for whiteboarding. Typically, offices and meeting rooms will have dry-erase boards or use flip charts for brainstorming and recording notes during meetings. In both cases, the laborious process of transferring the written notes from the boards or charts to digital is needed to ensure that the information is captured in a form that can then be easily archived or distributed.

ActivPanel LX: A TAA-compliant tech solution for the public sector

Promethean provides the security, dependability, and efficiency public service organizations demand—from military to law enforcement, government to health care. Interactive panels like Promethean’s ActivPanel LX support a wide range of operating systems, so any software used in a public sector environment can be displayed and interacted with on the panel.

The ActivPanel LX is Promethean’s most flexible, future-proof, and secure IFPD. It is TAA-compliant upon request and available in 65”, 75”, and 85” displays. OS-free by design, choosing the ActivPanel LX for any public sector organization means there’s one less device on an established network, and one less thing to worry about for IT administrators and users.

ActivPanel LX can always be paired with the latest, most up-to-date operating systems managed with existing security methods, outlasting other tech and making organizations and tasks in the public sector more efficient.

Are you ready to make the change? Learn how an interactive display can benefit your organization and request a free demo!