Site: Grange Academy, located on Halsey Road, Kempston, is a vibrant educational institution catering to pupils aged between 7 and 16.

Problem/Goal: Grange Academy recently faced a crucial challenge to provide independent pupil access to toilets while maintaining necessary staff supervision, ensuring pupil safety and dignity. Being a special needs school, they required only one pupil to be in the toilets at anyone one time due to the age range of pupils, but also required a safe system that could allow staff to enter and pupils to leave in the event of an emergency. The school required a reactive solution that could be carried out in a timely fashion and done within normal working hours.

Solution: To address this issue, the Academy asked ACFE to install access control on 12 toilet doors throughout the school. ACFE proposed fitting Paxton access control featuring a ‘read-in’ reader to work with the staff’s exiting proximity cards. Each toilet was designed with a request-to-exit button and an emergency release on the inside for normal egress and an emergency break glass unit that could be activated in the event of an emergency. All doors were designed to be fitted with magnetic locks to keep the doors secure, all doors were to be interconnected with the fire alarm system, to release in the event of fire and independent electrical power points installed at each door.

Outcome: The project was seamlessly executed within a week during normal school hours.

ACFE worked over the 5 days within a schedule of door priority that worked with the school’s itinerary. It was only by effective communication and coordination between ACFE and the senior leaders and teachers at the school that helped us work in collaboration minimising disruption to the school routine and lessons.

All ACFE staff are enhanced DBS checked but it is the added knowledge of experience working in a school environment and understanding of the day-to-day challenges that enabled ACFE staff to be efficient in their work, maintaining a tidy work area, keeping tools contained and away from pupils. As each door was completed, we made them live and then handed over an area at a time to the school. The electrical works, access control and all commissioning works was all completed by employed staff of ACFE and the project was completed on time. All doors were programmed for staff access and evening cleaner access.

The result was a secure yet accessible access control solution that saved staff significant time, increased efficiency, upheld pupil safety and dignity, and ensured only one pupil at a time could enter the toilets. With the added confidence of knowing in the event of an emergency or fire the system would release the doors.

Rachel Timms Headteacher’s Comments:

“The implementation of the access control system has made a remarkable difference to our school. It not only ensures the safeguarding and dignity of our pupils but also saves valuable staff time. The seamless execution of the project and the strong bond of trust with the ACFE technicians ensured minimal disruption and meant the school could continue its normal day while the works were being carried out. We are thrilled with the outcome and the positive impact it has had on our school community.”

Conclusion

By addressing the unique needs of The Grange Academy, the access control project has provided a practical solution that prioritises pupil safety, independence, and staff efficiency. With enhanced trust between the Academy and ACFE it meant we could implement an effective solution in a timely manner.