ADAPTING TO BEING A GEOGRAPHICALLY REMOTE SCHOOL DISTRICT
By nature of their remote location in central California, the facilities staff of Reef-Sunset Unified School District (RSUSD) have learned to be very self-sufficient when it comes to owning their facilities and properly maintaining them. “Asking service providers to provide service in a remote location like ours has proven to be challenging,” explains Javier Leon, security system administrator and project manager for RSUSD. “Which is why we have learned to be very self-sufficient with our systems and technology.”
BRASS KEY ACCESS CONTROL WAS BECOMING MORE PROBLEMATIC
Some of RSUSD systems, however, were proving to be woefully inadequate for their modern needs. In fact, the current brass key access control system at RSUSD was becoming more and more of a liability every day for the district. Javier explains,
“Several years ago we experienced a break-in at the elementary school in which they gained access to the building with a brass key, found the rest of the keys to the building inside and caused significant theft and damage. In addition to that, we were having issues with our brass keys going missing for all different reasons creating significant potential liability for the district.” These issues with their 24/7/365 undocumented brass key access control solution led Javier and the RSUSD leadership to begin looking for an affordable and scalable electronic access control solution to replace their brass key system and bring digital access to ALL doors.
PROXESS + DIY FOR THE WIN!
Learning of Proxess at a K-12 conference in late 2023, Mr. Leon realized Proxess was a worthy alternative to traditional hardwired electronic access control that could allow him and his facilities staff to easily install and maintain a modern, advanced security system themselves. “Every option we researched required us to have everything hardwired which was very expensive. And then we found Proxess,” explain Javier. After a formal, on-site presentation by Proxess and US Security Supply, Javier and the Reef-Sunset leadership team decided to try it out on their administration building as a trial. “Once our administration staff saw it in action they have loved it ever since,” Leon recalls. Through product delivery by US Security Supply combined with remote training support from Proxess , the RSUSD facilities staff was able to install the Proxess locks at the district office themselves allowing them to save even more money per door. “We were also able to reuse the existing hardware on the current online, hardwired doors on our old electronic access control system and bring those doors into the Proxess system too,” Javier explained. He continued, “We were able to do that ourselves too, giving us the confidence we needed to handle all aspects of installation of the Proxess system.” With their first brass key doors and electronic access online doors cutover to Proxess, the RSUSD locksmith quickly became one of the biggest advocates for Proxess. Javier recalls the locksmith saying, “Our solution was always just to rekey, new cores, new keys, all this extra work. It is just as expensive to rekey the whole the site than it is to buy Proxess locks and put us in a position to NEVER REKEY AGAIN.”
ONE WORD: MODERN
When asked what one word he would use to describe the Proxess solution, Javier thoughtfully responded saying “Modern”. He explained, “You have to get with the times. In the 2020s it doesn’t make sense anymore to be carrying a big brass key ring around. Plus the principals of our schools love Proxess!” With Proxess in place administrators can easily access all school facilities with a secure, digital credential which was never possible with their previous brass key system. In fact, RSUSD can update access for any user simply by updating their access profile in the ProxessIQ Software and as soon as the user touches their Proxess credential to a Proxess Online reader, their credential is updated with the new access profile. Try that with Brass Keys!