Customer: Silverdale School
Location: Sheffield, South Yorkshire
Requirement: Like many secondary schools Silverdale had a growing concern about the level of vaping among its students and the impact it was having on their health, as well as their attitude to learning.
Solution: Supply of the Halo Smart Sensors, which included pre-staging the devices so they were ready to plug and play on arrival. Advice on installation and how to use the devices once installed.
Services: Ecl-ips supplied 10 x Halo Smart Sensors, manufactured in the USA by IPVideo Corporation, part of Motorola Solutions.
Customer’s View: “Even if you are not able to purchase devices for all student toilets at once, consider installing them in key areas at first and then building up to a full rollout overtime.”
Silverdale School is a comprehensive secondary school providing education to 11–16-year-olds and sixth formers in Sheffield. The school also runs the South Yorkshire Teaching Hub, training new teachers for both primary and secondary schools, and supporting teachers throughout their careers; and the National Modern Languages SCITT – the only national teacher training course dedicated to modern languages.
Like many secondary schools Silverdale had a growing concern about the level of vaping among its students and the impact it was having on their health, as well as their attitude to learning. The school’s Assistant Head was tasked with investigating vape detectors. They did a lot of online research before making contact with a shortlist of providers, including Ecl-ips. The decision to install vape detectors was made when a new behaviour policy was introduced so pupils understood that vaping, and the associated disruption of lessons, were no longer going to be tolerated.
Blake Foster, Business Support Services Manager, said the school decided to purchase HALO Smart Sensors, rather than other vape detectors because the devices are easy to install and update so the system was future-proofed. The HALO Smart Sensor can be installed discreetly in private areas such as changing rooms and toilets. The school has enclosed toilet cubicles with an extraction fan and floor to ceiling doors. Due to the ‘Vape Detection’ range of the HALO Smart Sensor being 6ft radius of the device we would not normally advise the device to be placed outside of that perimeter and certainly not outside of cubicles that have floor to ceiling toilet doors. However, Silverdale, were happy to try the sensors being installed outside of the cubicles to help with the budget, and are very pleased that it has led to vape being detected successfully.
The HALO Smart Sensor is a power over ethernet (POE) device which means it receives its data and power over a single Cat5e ethernet cable so connecting it up and getting started is simple. Ecl-ips has well-established expertise in data cabling so we can do this as well as the installation. However, if customers can do the cabling we can just come and install the HALO Smart Sensor, or Ecl-ips will also supply only as we have done for Silverdale School. Ecl-ips will always take care of setting up the HALO Smart Sensor for you, including ensuring the firmware is always up to date and that all your requirements for detection are set up correctly. Then we can train and support customers remotely if required. Commenting on the installation Blake said:
“We were provided with a pre-installation proforma to ensure that the system was calibrated correctly. Then it was just a matter of ensuring that we had network points in place ready for installation. The biggest piece of work after this was naming each device so that we knew the precise location of activation.”
The HALO Smart Sensor is always providing vape detection with no delay in event notifications and alerts which can be received by email. Additionally, the HALO Smart Sensor can detect tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), which is found in cannabis, either within vapes or being smoked. Blake commented that the device had detected THC at school and this had ultimately led to the exclusion of one of their pupils.
The HALO Smart Sensor has a tamper detection which will alert you to problems such as students trying to interfere with the device and has an IK10 vandal-resistance rating. Additionally, its aggression detection feature means the HALO detects abnormal noise levels. Schools then receive notifications when anti-social behaviour or bullying could be a problem. Proving the aggression detection is effective, the devices at the school picked up high noise levels after school had ended for the day. Fortunately, this turned out to be the cleaning staff chattering loudly rather than any trouble between students!
Separately, with five key words pre-programmed, the device can notify staff of calls for help.
Ecl-ips has been providing security solutions, in particular CCTV, to schools for over a decade and the HALO Smart Sensor is a useful addition to its product range for support monitoring in schools. Blake said vaping had been reduced. Like many schools they were using the using the device alongside the CCTV cameras located outside the toilets allowing them to identify perpetrators and have a time and date stamped recording of footing corelating with the vape sensor alert.
Although some schools may be deterred by the price initially Blake said he would recommend the HALO to all secondary schools.
Result: The HALO Smart Sensors are reducing the level of vaping at the school. The school believes this is protecting the health and safety of students.
Benefits:
Blake said the best thing about the system is that it is:
“Simple to install and update”
Download a copy of the Silverdale School Case Study PDF