Industry Professional

Controlling The Keys

School district deploys access control system

• By Jennifer Robinson
• Feb 01, 2017

In 2004, Brian Gruchow, director of Maintenance, Operations and Transportation needed a solution for a district- wide key control problem. The Roseville, Calif., Joint Unified School District consisted of four high schools, one independent school, one continuation school and a transportation department, with plans for a fifth high school, which has since opened. At the time, it was estimated that each school lost 20 keys per year. It was financially prohibitive to rekey the entire school at each occurrence; in fact, a complete rekey had not occurred in 30 years.

After a year of in–depth research and testing of many systems, the RJUSD found CyberLock’s access control system to be the solution that best fit the district’s needs, including installation and maintenance. The cost savings in converting to CyberLock were immediately recognized when they realized there was no requirement for hardwiring; they could use their existing Schlage and Corbin-Russwin hardware; and there was no need to provide and change out batteries in the locks.

The district started the conversion in 2005 by doing the exterior doors first, thanks to a C.O.P.S. grant from local law enforcement. When the new Antelope High School was built, it used Cyber- Lock throughout. Currently, RJUSD has more than 80 percent of the similar locks installed. Gruchow’s goal is to have the school district at 100 percent as budgets allow. This includes the 103-year–old Roseville High School building, with plans of a new high school being drawn up.

RJUSD currently has 1,480 locks and 1,008 keys in use. Since implementing the access control system, lock vandalism has decreased by 90 percent, and approximately 70 percent of the locks are still the original locks that were installed. About half of the keys have been replaced with rechargeable keys to “get out of the battery business.” The rechargeable keys are also an environmentally more green option that reduces waste and cost.

The four main benefits RJUSD has enjoyed in the last decade of using Cyber- Lock are: the reduced number of keys, never having to rekey, the simplicity of use and the audit trail records via the software. The individual school sites saw such a benefit that they started using their own budget to implement more locks. They are now adding more padlocks and switch locks to allow for audit trails on alarm keypads and HVAC override switches, which will help with accountability of energy usage. An additional benefit was the ability to use the audit trail for time and attendance.

With a student population of more than 10,000 across numerous campuses, providing security has now been made easier with the CyberLock conversion.

This article originally appeared in the February 2017 issue of Security Today.