Hey Sophie,
Long time community member, sponsor, presenter- rare that I jump into the conversation :) But, this is my jam..
Just like attendance is required for class, many many institutions require it for co-curricular attendance as well (departments, clubs, athletics..). How else can they determine if they're reaching the intended audience, if at-risk students are participating or not and in what, and best use student fees to deliver an engaging experience?
Surveys show the majority of students want their data used to improve their experience, as is the case in the rest of the services in their worlds.
Whatever tools schools use, whether home-built or contracted out, they certainly have to consider privacy, data security, and so on. Companies like ours that are built for data have legal agreements, security procedures, so on as you would expect. To Lucian's point, legal is generally fine with 3rd parties as long as the proper protections are in place (data stored securely, access controlled, ownership retained, data use restricted). Universities use hundreds to 3rd party tools to collect and understand data, and no tool that doesn't properly protect data would pass muster.
RE requiring tracking, and saying this lightly, you can require whatever you want. Student orgs have to have roster numbers, officers, constitutions, trainings, etc to get funding and stay active. They may have to use a technology to facilitate those processes. Collecting data to demonstrate where their funding goes is in line with what's already happening. And it creates the opportunity for better leadership development- answering for results is something graduates need to get used to quickly, might as well start learning that through their co-curricular experiences.
Institutionally, the benefits of this are clear with regard to the bottom line (have to plug a couple partners for their work on this:
Lynn and
Valdosta). As critical health/reporting needs arise, having systems in place to track student participation is the only scalable way to be sure you'll be able to facilitate contact tracing and reporting. We went so far as to
build it in. You don't have to something that advanced however, as long as the data is being collected the reporting isn't too difficult. And to your point, you've got to have a culture of collecting data in Student Affairs- this is generally a top down thing used in large engagement and retention work.
The competing tools in our industry all track attendance via various methods- magnetic stripe swiping on phones or computers, barcode scanning, digital ID scanning (QR codes on phone), tap/proximity/RFID check-in, self reporting and self check-in, etc. There are pros and cons to how they do this, but there are enough options to chose from so that you can find something that fits well with your needs.
I've personally worked with many dozens of institutions to move toward attendance tracking campus-wide, and the process and results have been rewarding. Students adapt well, don't mind the verification, and the benefits outweigh the occasional privacy concern- especially when the right protections are in place. Thinking long term, there's a lot to be gained from this data.
All that said, I don't see how we
don't mandate participation data collection if we'll be forced to track and report student interaction. All the medical experts see this set of challenges hanging around for quite some time, and I'm sure it'll be touch and go this coming year. As long as you handle data well, and consider what tools would work the most effectively for your unique setup, there are attainable solutions out there.
Here to help if I can contribute more!
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Andy Gould
Chief Revenue Officer
Saint Petersburg FL
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Original Message:
Sent: 06-12-2020 14:44
From: Sophie Tullier
Subject: Attendance Data, Contact Tracing, & Privacy
As we begin to think about returning to campus and preparing for our (hybrid) fall, has anyone started thinking about how you will manage contact tracing for your student events? What sort of requirements and enforcement will you be doing with your student organizations? Will being tracked become a mandatory aspect of attending events? What concerns, issues, and ideas are you considering around student privacy concerns?
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Sophie Tullier
Assistant Director for Assessment & Research
University of Maryland
College Park MD
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