Wireless Lockdown System Installed at St. Joseph’s Primary School

St. Joseph’s Catholic Primary School is a vibrant and engaging mid-size primary school with 189 pupils in Halifax, West Yorkshire. The school is highly regarded both academically and socially and places an emphasis on the teachings of the Catholic religion. At the heart of the school is a caring and creative learning environment where all students are made to feel safe. St. Joseph’s recently approached D-Tect based in Leeds, to install a lockdown system to be used in the case of an emergency or threat to children and staff.

For this particular site, a mixture of internal and external call points and sounder/beacons were used with the Master call point situated in the main school office. Three external sounder/beacons were placed around the playground and entrance with a further seven units sited inside the school. Using a proven, secure mesh protocol, when one Nexus unit is activated, it triggers all units in range to sound an audible alert accompanied by a flashing beacon light.

Nexus lockdown units are blue to differentiate them from traditional fire alarms. In line with recent Ofsted guidelines, which state that a lockdown alarm must be distinctive in sound from a fire alarm, there are 32 sounds to choose from. There is also a voice variant available which will sound a lockdown message which can be customised by the school. The caretaker at St. Joseph’s was able to advise the engineers of the best positions for the Nexus alert points. As a result, the installation was completed within a few hours.

QED customer, D-Tect, install Nexus Wireless Lockdown System

Given the high costs involved in wiring a traditional system, both in terms of manpower and installation costs, D-Tect were delighted to be able to offer St. Joseph’s a competitive price for the wireless lockdown system. At the same time, they were commissioned to install an internal public address system for the school’s announcements.

Natalie Marshall, Director at D-Tect commented: “With the introduction of new Ofsted guidelines many schools and colleges are looking to introduce an efficient lockdown system with minimum disruption to their existing systems already in place. It is in this regard that the Nexus lockdown system comes into its own with its unique features. Our campaign offering safety and security checks to schools and colleges within the Yorkshire Region has proved to be a great success, with St Joseph’s being one of our first installations. We have now expanded our coverage to the remainder of the UK, and plan to provide suitable solutions to many more schools and colleges throughout the country.”

Quality Essential Distribution (QED), in Preston, supplied the Nexus units to D-Tect. QED remained on hand to provide technical expertise and support during the installation.

View the Nexus Lockdown System here.

Please contact us if you have any questions about the Nexus system or would like to discuss your bespoke requirements.

Call: 01772 336 111
Email sales@qedgroup.co.uk