What To Look For When Selecting Your Access Control System

WSI Comandix on February 3, 2022

Does your current access control system need an upgrade? Are you thinking about bringing this technology to your school district, business, or municipality?

Here are three key areas to evaluate whether you’re considering installing or upgrading your access control system.

Do You Need A Way To Improve Daily Operations Or Automate Intruder Prevention?

Do any of these situations sound familiar?

  • Your staff is checking IDs by hand each morning
  • You’re still using locked file cabinets to protect sensitive information from unwanted eyes
  • You’re manually controlling who enters the building and when they do so

If any of these apply to your school district, business, or municipality, chances are that you want an even safer, more efficient, and more effective mode of knowing (and controlling) who’s allowed into buildings and on your grounds. Automating your school’s safety through access control technology not only improves the daily flow of people into and out of your building, but it also reduces the likelihood of human error by taking staff out of the manual operations that technology can do more efficiently. And that means a safer district for students, faculty, staff, and visitors.

When you’re considering whether to install or upgrade your access control system, it’s important to evaluate your day-to-day operations that could benefit from such changes and the added level of safety and security those changes would bring.

Some potential safety features that can be provided by an access control system include:

Swipe Card And Card Reader Technologies

Swipe card readers prevent unauthorized entrance by adding a layer of security to entryways. Eastern DataComm specializes in installing new swipe card systems and providing customers with existing systems the upgrades they need to ensure the highest level of access control and physical security possible.

Request To Exit Systems (REX)

Eastern DataComm offers both motion detection that releases the door when it senses motion and an exit button that releases the door when pressed. When using magnetic locks in your access control system, a request to exit button is required in case of emergencies. In emergency situations, it will disable the magnet’s locking power and allow for exit through that door.

Door Position Indicators And Magnetic Locks

Door position indicators and magnetic locks allow for controlled access and notification of potential security risks by using a system of doors, magnets, locks, and indicators to show if a door is open or closed, which could indicate the presence of an intruder.

Does Your Access Control System Integrate With An Emergency Response Notification System?

Another key consideration is how adding or enhancing an access control system can keep your district safe in the event of a fire, intruder, lockdown, or other urgent situation.

In cases like these, you’ll want to ensure your building’s fire escape plan and emergency lockdown procedures are not in opposition to one another.

And restricting access to certain areas in the event of an emergency or lockdown situation becomes faster, easier, and more effective when you have an access control system with technology that integrates with your emergency notification system.

At Eastern DataComm, our Lockdown and Emergency Notification System – LENS + OPTICS – integrates seamlessly with the access control systems we install and maintain for customers.

LENS (Lockdown Emergency Notification System) is a comprehensive notification platform that integrates with a school’s phone and paging/intercom systems. Once activated, communication is rapid and automated, including pre-recorded announcements over the PA system, activation of LED beacons and signboards, calls to cell phones and desk phones, PC pop-ups, emails, text messages, and pre-recorded calls to police.

To cover remote areas outside of the building, Eastern DataComm takes measures like installing wireless-enabled speakers and LED beacons to ensure complete coverage over the entire school grounds. Additionally, video surveillance can also be incorporated with LENS, which can quickly help law enforcement and first responders pinpoint the location of the identified threat.

LENS+OPTICS, coupled with access control, allows for restricting access to certain parts of buildings and grounds during emergency situations. Integration with other aspects of access control including Request To Exit Systems, Swipe Card Systems, and Door Position Indicators provide added information regarding a potential intruder and increase safety measures in the event of a lockdown.

To ensure that your LENS solution is running optimally, OPTICS, our continuous monitoring services, keeps eyes on your lockdown and emergency notification system so you don’t lose focus on your school’s safety.

This means our team at Eastern DataComm can create a comprehensive emergency notification system combined with access control, leading to further physical on-premises safety and security.

Do You Know What To Look For In Your Access Control Partner?

Finally, in addition to considering how access control can make your daily operations more streamlined, you’ll want to be sure that you have the right team on your side for planning, installing, and maintaining the system. When you work with our Safety and Communications Advisors and Technicians at Eastern DataComm, you can rest assured that you have the right technology and support resources in place to safeguard your school, business, or municipality community in the event of an emergency or lockdown Eastern DataComm has served hundreds of schools, businesses, and municipalities with customized technology solutions tailored to their unique needs and priorities. We not only offer seamless installation and unparalleled maintenance support, but we’re also happy to provide our customers with actionable insights stemming from our collective expertise in emergency notification, creating solutions that ensure ongoing safety and security.

Connect With Eastern DataComm

To learn more about how our team can support you as you install or upgrade your access control and emergency response technology, contact us at [email protected] for a complimentary consultation.

Is Your Emergency Notification System Working for You? Here’s How to Tell

WSI Comandix on January 10, 2022

School and government administrators have had an overwhelming volume and variety of unprecedented issues to handle these last two years. Not only has COVID-19 altered the physical and psychological landscape of schools, but there has also been an increase in serious incidents such as multi-victim homicides being perpetrated in educational facilities across the country. These frightening incidents have led many decision-makers in both education and government to explore the potential for emergency notification systems as a tool that enables rapid communication to first-responders who can mitigate damage and loss of life.

These emergency communications systems are typically initiated as soon as a school or building goes into lockdown. They allow administrators to communicate with emergency responders outside of the building to bring about a safer resolution to the incident whenever possible.

To help ensure the safety of our children at school, administrators are making strides to put strong safeguards in place that can help protect their communities, starting with a robust emergency alert system.

Three Main Features an Emergency Alert System Must Have

An emergency alert system, also called an emergency notification system, is a safety and communication solution designed to quickly broadcast emergency alerts and notify the proper channels, including police, students, and administrators inside and outside of the building. These notifications, along with a variety of other warning features, get the word out as quickly as possible. For example, they give instructions to those inside the building on whether they should evacuate or shelter in place.

However, every emergency notification system is not created equal. Here are a few features your school or municipality building’s emergency alert system must have in order to save lives.

The 20-Second Rule

The first 20 seconds of an emergency situation are undoubtedly the most critical. Your emergency alert system should be able to be activated from anywhere inside your building so that you aren’t wasting precious seconds in transit to a panic button that’s locked in an office or across the hall.

Fully Automated

Once an alert is triggered, your emergency notification system should be fully automated. The last thing you want is to expend your resources and time doing things that could be handled by technology – removing the opportunity for human error. The best emergency alert solutions can do everything themselves, from the initial active shooter or lockdown alert to deliver pre-recorded emergency notifications to law enforcement and first responders. These notifications include everything from texts and computer pop-ups to audio and visual notifications for students, faculty and staff that are visually or hearing impaired both within the school buildings themselves.

Complete Campus Coverage

With many schools getting larger and more geographically spread out, it’s never been more important for an emergency notification system to be able to cover the entire school grounds. That means inside AND outside school buildings. Places like athletic fields and parking lots can often be overlooked, but also need to be included in the coverage plans.

LENS+OPTICS Delivers Safety and Peace of Mind

A safe school environment is an essential component of what conditions empower effective learning. When students feel unsafe, they are more likely to engage in risky behaviors and score notably lower on standardized tests. Over the last few years, the percentage of children who feel safe at school has declined, and concerns from both parents and children tend to be at their highest immediately following a high-profile school shooting.

Investing in an emergency notification system reassures parents and students that the safety of your school campus is top priority. The Lockdown Emergency Notification System (LENS) Solution from Eastern DataComm is a comprehensive system that offers improved overall communication during a lockdown or incident. Coupled with OPTICS, Eastern DataComm’s continuous monitoring service, you can rest easy knowing that the technology you have in place is ready to respond when it is needed most.

What to expect with LENS + OPTICS

Our LENS+ OPTICS can be integrated with a school district’s current communication system, thanks to the expertise of our safety and communications technicians. From there, the LENS Solution can be activated by pressing a lockdown button, dialing a code from an on-premise phone, or even activating from a smartphone application.

Once activated, the system plays an automated pre-recorded announcement over the school’s existing paging system, as well as around the perimeter of the grounds. It reaches external areas like sports fields and portable school classrooms. Audio and visual alerts like strobes and LED signboards are installed to ensure loud areas like the auditorium and cafeteria are adequately covered.

After the initial warning, automated calls with a pre-recorded lockdown message are sent to first responders like the local police and other key administrators throughout the district like the superintendent, principal, and school security staff. Notifications also include PC screen pop-ups, emails, and text messages about the lockdown event.

OPTICS, which continuously monitors components that affect LENS to ensure it is always running optimally. In the event of a crisis, LENS+ OPTICS is the force that provides those in charge of ensuring the safety of their school campus with the ability to handle any critical situation as best as possible.

Want to learn more about how it works? You can explore the details of our LENS Solution here.

Why Partner with Eastern DataComm?

Eastern DataComm developed LENS + OPTICS after working closely with state officials, local police, and other school safety experts. The sole focus of our work has been to create a solution that can expedite communication, allowing for quick action in response to a threat on school or municipality grounds.

From design, to set-up, to testing, to monitoring, we’ll be with you every step of the way to ensure that your chosen solution works for the unique safety needs that define your campus.

Work with Eastern DataComm to Deploy LENS + OPTICS as Your Emergency Notification System

Eastern DataComm has been working with hundreds of school districts for over 30 years to assist them with improving safety and communications through leveraging technology. Our continued goal has been to offer reassurance to students, faculty, and staff that they will be able to respond as quickly as possible in the event of an emergency.

Contact us today to learn more about our comprehensive communication systems, and to discuss with our team of safety advisors what solutions might be best for your school’s needs.

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