3, 2, 1 Contactless

Jul 1, 2003 12:00 PM, BY RANDY SOUTHERLAND

Overlooking Pennsylvania's Lake Erie, Mercyhurst College is as much a tribute to the past as it is a center for educating professionals of the future. In contrast to its Tudor-Gothic style architecture, the college has turned to modern access control technology.

Locks and keys of the past are giving way to smart cards of today — and not only do they open doors, they can also serve as a means for students to pay for anything from meals to photocopies.

The conversion process began in 2001, when the college began the task of upgrading its HVAC building systems.

“As we got very near the end of the building management process, I was asked to put access control on the same format,” recalls Robert Middleton, a consulting engineer with R.M. Middleton & Associates, who had been hired to select a building management system.

Andover, Mass.-based Andover Controls Corp. was chosen to provide the building project's front-end facility management system. An Andover system was also preselected as the hardware for the access control system.

U&S Services Inc., Tonawanda, N.Y., was already deeply engaged in building control processes when the company was approached to provide a plan for installing a modern access control system in Mercyhurst's new Audrey Hirt Academic Center, as well as in the campus's five freshman dorms. Its mission was to convert the buildings from key to card access.

This move to provide better access control offered the college the opportunity to upgrade and simplify other basic functions at the same time. “It started off as a normal proximity project, and as we started working with the college we realized that they had a lot of cards for a lot of different things,” says John Wojcik, vice president for engineered systems at U&S Services. “They had one card for the library, one for student ID, a copy card, and this was going to be the fourth one.”

“We thought that over time we could gradually phase out of the legacy stuff,” Wojcik recalls.

He chose the iClass contactless smart card from HID Corp., Irvine, Calif., which features 16 kbits (2 kBytes) with 16 application areas. To run all the systems the college planned for the cards, the cards needed to house a smart chip, magnetic stripe and debit stripe for various transactions.

Since the HID card can accommodate each of these multiple technologies, Mercyhurst decided to move slowly to a one-card system.

“They could slowly phase out the mag and debit functions and use the ability of the smart card to do all the things they need to do on the campus,” Wojcik says.

A one-card mission

Mercyhurst officials — including facility, police and safety officials — conducted meetings with outside experts to explore the possibilities. Other nearby colleges had also gone to a one-card system to enable them to manage all information and handle the processing of funds.

Officials decided against taking on that level of responsibility due to liability issues. Each vendor currently handles the canceling of privileges when cards are lost.

After the initial trial-and-error phase, the college found it had good reason to think about moving all of the functions to the chip. Cards that are swiped simply were not as durable as those that only used the proximity function. The magnetic stripe and debit readers would sometimes jam, thus preventing the card from being removed without destroying it. Over the course of a year, Mercyhurst security officials replaced more than 500 cards.

Part of this replacement was necessitated when the Student Union first began issuing cards to students. Using a DTC 515-LC printer provided by Eden Prairie, Minn.-based Fargo Electronics Inc., officials created identification cards for all students, staff and faculty members. Because it was the practice with previous ID cards, they punched a hole in the card to indicate it as active. Sometimes in the process they inadvertently severed the card's antenna, rendering it unable to open doors.

While the lack of prox functionality did not affect most students still using keys, it made a big difference for the incoming freshmen — and anyone else — who had to enter the new academic building, where both outside doors and the entrances to interior labs were added to the card access system.

Freshmen were issued new cards, and college public safety officials took over making the ID cards for students, faculty and staff. As more buildings are converted to card access, the remaining damaged cards will also be replaced.

Over time they also discovered the cards had a tendency to fade — some to the point where photos were no longer recognizable. The department decided to purchase a laminating machine and has begun coating the cards after each one is made or replaced. Officials say that they believe those extra mils of plastic will greatly extend the life of the cards.

“With card access control, we can control the group that is using the building that year,” says Sgt. Kenneth Kensill of the Mercyhurst Police Department. “We can alter their access privileges or take them out of the system when they graduate or move to a different dorm.”

Access to dorms is disabled when the campus is closed for the end of a semester. This change in procedure has nearly eliminated theft that occurred when the dorms were officially empty, but keys were still being used to gain entry.

The system now provides the central monitoring station with an alarm whenever a door is left propped open.

“Sometimes [students] will prop a door while they carry something in, but if it's open longer, then an officer is sent over to find out why it's propped open,” Kensill says.

Ultimately, the entire campus, along with its second location — the 84-acre Mercyhurst Northeast — will be converted to card access. This summer, three to four additional buildings, including the college library, will also be converted to card access.

“We're taking it in stages,” says Middleton.

Greater use of the smart card's 16 application areas will come as facilities such as the library and copy center are able to purchase new readers and software.

FOR THE RECORD

About The Companies

For information, circle the Reader Service number (listed below) or visit securitysolutions.com

Andover Controls Corp.	21
Fargo Electronics Inc.	22
HID Corp.	23
R.M. Middleton and Assoc.	24
U&S Services Inc.	25

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