[CAUT] locked practice rooms

[Porritt, David]

Don:

Our practice room area is locked and access is by swiping the school ID card.  Inside that area, the grand piano practice rooms are locked requiring a key.  Students get keys for the grand piano rooms (they're all keyed the same) if they are registered for applied piano.  When we have auditions, or reasons for outsiders to have access, the practice room area is simply unlocked.  If people need the grand piano rooms someone is assigned to give them access, or the doors are temporarily blocked open.

We did have one problem come up because fire codes required that area to be open.  That was fixed by having the locks on the practice room area tied to the fire alarm system.  If we have a fire drill the doors are automatically unlocked as the alarm sounds (a system not unlike a prison system).

Since we've made these changes we've had far less of a theft problem, and so far vandalism has been eliminated.

The fire code problem took some creative thinking on the part of the architect but it works very well.

If you have questions about our system just let me know.  I'm retired now and have the time!

dave


David M. Porritt, RPT
dporritt at smu.edu<mailto:dporritt at smu.edu>

From: caut-bounces at ptg.org [mailto:caut-bounces at ptg.org] On Behalf Of Donald McKechnie
Sent: Thursday, February 11, 2010 8:52 AM
To: caut at ptg.org
Subject: [CAUT] locked practice rooms

List,

After the vandalism in the practice rooms in December I stepped up my push to have the practice rooms locked. I thought this would be the best chance but I'm still running into opposition. The concerns expressed are valid so I'm trying to find solutions.

Besides the cost, the primary opposition against locking the rooms is access. We have many people coming in the building that need to use the practice rooms. The school hosts conferences, competitions and workshops such as MTNA, etc. Also, on our audition days the rooms need to be open and outside accompanists occasionally need to use these rooms. All this is seen as a logistical nightmare to allow access when needed.

Due to the layout of the building and fire codes we do not have the means to lock the doors into the practice room area. Hiring personnel to police the area is not in the realm of possibilities. We have been discussing security cameras and that may happen.

I do not have any good answers to the concerns so I'm throwing this out to the wisdom on this list. Are there any experiences like I have outlined? For those who have locked practice rooms, how do you handle giving access to outside folks?

Regards,
Don


Donald McKechnie
Piano Technician
Ithaca College
dmckech at ithaca.edu<mailto:dmckech at ithaca.edu>
607.274.3908





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