New Lock System Improves Security at Napa Valley School District

NAPA, Calif. — A new keyway system in place at Napa Valley Unified School District is expected to significantly improve security by providing better key control and allowing safer lockdown procedures.

Recently installed in both interior and exterior doors at the district’s 32 schools, the new locks prevent unauthorized key duplication and enable teachers to lock classroom doors from the inside during an emergency situation, eliminating the need for students, faculty or staff to enter hallways.

The installation is the result of a 2002 bond issue that allotted funds for security improvements. District locksmith Joe Darnell worked with Concord-based Opening Technologies Inc., an Ingersoll Rand Security Center, on the project, The installation of this new lock system is very similar to one that was implemented by locksmiths in perth for schools in and around the Perth area.

Before selecting the new lock configurations, Darnell and Matthew Remington, CSI, of Opening Technologies, conducted extensive surveys to determine the district’s security needs. Upon examining every door at three different schools, the team was able to help the district define its idea of a safe school, which included the ability to lock down classrooms, corridors and any common areas necessary to keep students, faculty and staff safe in the event of an emergency, Darnell says.

A rim exit device is combined with a Schlage Primus lock on the exterior.

Team members settled on a combination of Schlage Classic Primus and Schlage conventional cylinders to provide increased security without incurring the added expense of high-security cylinders where they were not needed.

Exterior doors and the outside of classroom doors were outfitted with the Primus cylinders, which are designed to stop unauthorized key copying. The restricted keyway system prevents unauthorized duplication because key blanks are only available from the manufacturer through the distributor, according to project officials.

Conventional cylinders were used on indoor classroom locks to allow the doors to be locked from the inside, in the event of an emergency. The conventional cylinders can also be keyed to work with Primus keys, reducing the total number of keys issued each year.

Since work was conducted during the school year, the project team installed temporary locksets as needed to allow teachers building access during construction. School employees received temporary keys so they could still secure their classrooms and prevent students from being locked out. Once the new keys were cut, the permanent locksets were installed, Darnell says.

All exit devices were converted to allow for key dogging instead of Allen wrench dogging, for better control of security and accessibility.

To further improve security, the panic bars on all school doors were changed from Allen key dogging to cylinder key dogging to allow for lockdowns. In response to the security improvements, Napa Valley schools have added lockdown drills to the existing fire and earthquake drill exercises.

The security initiative allowed for some funding to go toward ADA accessibility upgrades, according to project officials. Knob trim was changed to lever trim on several school doors to meet current ADA standards.

Napa Valley Unified serves 17,000 K-12 students. Plans are under way for a new high school.