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Integrated security secures campus

A US university has implemented a multitiered client server architecture as a multicampus solution for integrating its building and vehicle access control, CCTV, ID badging, intrusion detection, asset detection, and fire alarm systems.

Founded in 1891, Delaware State University (DSU) is a fully accredited and diverse university. With its main location in Dover, Delaware, and campuses in Georgetown and Wilmington, DSU offers 67 undergraduate degrees, 18 graduate degrees, and two doctoral programmes to more than 3300 students each year – which includes a school record of 3722 students in the autumn Semester 2005.

Since DSU uses safety as a differential in recruiting students, it is the responsibility of the DSU Police Department to maintain a safe environment for the campus community. For effective and efficient operation, the campus police found it needed a way to streamline its operations. DSU chief of Police, James Overton, turned to systems integrator Advantech, in Dover, Delaware to provide a solution. Advantech selected Honeywell as its partner of choice.

Advantech selected Honeywell’s ProWatch Security Management System, a multitiered client server architecture, as a multicampus solution for integration of DSU’s building and vehicle access control, CCTV, ID badging, intrusion detection, asset detection, and fire alarm systems. With ProWatch, each campus entity can manage its own building.

Public Safety, acting as overall system administrator, has access to all locations to provide security for the entire campus. To streamline the registration process, Advantech worked with Honeywell Professional Services to integrate ProWatch with DSU’s student accounts/HR, dining and library systems.

Now when a student registers, a card holder record is automatically created within ProWatch and dormitory access rights are assigned. To complete the registration process, the student simply walks into the ID Badging Centre where his picture is taken and signature is electronically captured. In less than a minute, the student’s ID card is printed and automatically encoded for meal plan and bookstore use and is printed with the library system’s barcode.

In response to a need from Public Safety to provide its officers in the field with the ability to verify the status of students and also to confirm if they are eligible for admission to events, Advantech along with Honeywell brought in Beacon Technologies to provide an integrated mobile solution that leveraged the ProWatch system. Working together, they developed mobile handheld scanners which maintain card holder databases synced with ProWatch. These mobile ID scanners also function as ticket writers.

“This integration of ProWatch with the student accounts system saves the university thousands of hours per year in data entry and wasted time. Instead of running multiple independent systems, the card holder record only has to be entered once. Not only does this save time, it dramatically increases accuracy since it ensures the card holder’s record is identical throughout all the systems,” explains Schaeffer.

The integration also provides an increased security level. If a student is expelled or if a staff member retires, once this entry is made in the Student Account/HR system, that individual’s access rights can be automatically cancelled within ProWatch.

“In the past, it was contingent on someone from administration remembering to call Public Safety to cancel the individual’s access rights. If it was forgotten, then that person could have access rights indefinitely,” explains Overton.

The handheld scanners also help save time in the field. When there is a campus event, Public Safety can set up admission points anywhere on the perimeter of an event and quickly admit authorised students. It also saves the university the cost of printing and issuing paper admission tickets.

The ticket writing function also offers other benefits. “In the past, it could take an officer up to 20 minutes to manually write down information, document the violation and issue the ticket. Now all the officer has to do is scan the ID, check the violation and location on the mobile ticker writers and it prints the ticket. Tickets can be generated within a minute, allowing the officer to return to duty,” concludes Overton.

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