Founded in 1898, Mary Immaculate College is a university-level College of Education and Liberal Arts school, academically linked with the University of Limerick. Located in the southern suburbs of Limerick City, within ten minutes walking distance of the city center, Mary Immaculate is a Catholic foundation which has about 3,000 students and 250 staff. There are more than 50 lecture theaters and meeting rooms on campus and the college offers undergraduate programs for bachelor. degrees and a range of postgraduate programs at the masters and doctoral levels.

Kieran Gorey of DoorWare says: “The previous access control system at the college used simple mechanical keys and the decision was taken to upgrade this to a more capable electronic access control system for the benefit of students and staff.

“To achieve this, the college has adopted a strategic approach installing a security system that can also be implemented across additional areas and departments as time and budgets dictate. To do this with fully on line doors as part of a fully hard wired solution would have been prohibitively expensive. Our solution has been to specify the SALTO product which delivers 90% of the benefits of a fully on line access control system at the cost of a stand alone system. Initially we’ve replaced the mechanical locks in three buildings, installing SALTO Systems XS4 electronic smart locks in a brushed stainless steel finish in their place in the library and two student accommodation buildings.”

These are complemented by online wall reader units utilizing the power of the SALTO Virtual Network (SVN). This is also linked in to the handle sets spreading the access control system further into the buildings whilst still allowing for on-line access provision where needed.”

To gain access to their accommodation, students use their own personal ID card. This is a multi-application combination card that serves not only as a photo ID but also as a proximity smart card, and is presented to wall readers controlling access via main entrance doors to the buildings themselves.

Paul Murphy, computer services manager at Mary Immaculate College, comments: “Having security that is reliable and dependable is obviously key for us since in addition to the need to access our learning facilities we also house many young people in our student accommodation. The flexibility of our new SALTO access control system means the college can get the maximum benefit from the technology whilst providing a secure environment for all our students and staff, and in future we’re also likely to want to integrate it with our student printing and photocopying needs as well as cashless vending and car park barrier control.”