Card, mobile credential, payment and security
A new dining initiative at Northwestern University is giving students a flexible option for times when fitting a sit-down meal into the daily schedule isn't possible. The new program will see reusable to-go containers made available to students visiting campus dining halls.
According to an official university release, the new takeout container option is designed to enable eating on the go without generating unnecessary waste. Students who opt to join the new "Choose to Reuse" program can receive the new takeout containers from the university's Elder Hall, and in the process skip the sit-down dining experience. And because the carry-out containers are exchanged, cleaned and reused, it’s an simple and sustainable way to provide students with meals on the go.
Students can add the Choose to Reuse option to their meal plans at a one-time cost of $5 per year by signing up at the dining hall cashier station or by visiting Northwestern Dining’s e-commerce website. Cash, credit, debit, Northwestern's Cat Cash, and dining dollars are all accepted forms of payment for the program.
After signing up, participants receive a Choose to Reuse card. They can then take this card to the dining hall, swipe for their meals using their Wild Cards, Northwestern's student ID card, and inform the cashier that they want to use a takeout container. The cashier will then take the Choose to Reuse card in exchange for a clean container. The student is then free to fill the container as they see fit and take their meal to go.
As with other reusable takeout container programs, Northwestern students can swap the used container for a clean one upon their next visit to the dining hall if they want to take another meal on the go. Students can also opt to return their containers and get their cards back for use at a later time.
The Choose to Reuse program is only available at Elder Hall. The university says that the program is intended to offer flexibility for students with tight schedules, and with Elder Hall’s newer menu options and extended hours, that location was deemed the best fit to launch the program. Northwestern Dining is planning to expand the Choose to Reuse program to additional campus dining facilities across its main and south campuses by 2018.
Students at San Francisco State University can now use their OneCards for discounted transit services, following an integration with San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency. The integration effectively makes existing student ID cards into valid Clipper Cards, the Bay Areas's transit credential.
Underpinning the initiative is a new card printing process that reads the information on the Clipper Card and assigns it to a student ID number in the university's database. In one pass through the card printer, a student’s information, picture, and university logo and design are all printed onto the new SFSU OneCard, making it ready to use as both a student ID and transit pass.
The result is the SFSU Gator Pass. Acting as a Clipper Card -- the all-in-one transit card for the Bay Area -- the Gator Pass project began with the fall 2017 semester, and includes unlimited rides on SF Muni rail and buses, excluding cable cars. Student transit discounts and pass activation are sent to Clipper when students pay their Gator Pass fee. As part of tuition and fees, all students pay $180 per semester for the transit service.
“It’s the ability to integrate the transit card solution with the current SFSU OneCard system that makes this a superior card printing solution," says John Gates, director of fiscal operations at SFSU. "The integration allows for data sharing with many systems allowing the latest ID card information to be current as a new card is issued."
The transit discounts will be activated on the first day of fall or spring semester in which an individual is enrolled as a student. The service will be active on all weekdays, weekends and holidays throughout the academic year, excluding only the summer term and the January intercession term.
OneCard/Gator Pass discounts will be active on the first day of semester for all students who have paid tuition and fees and have signed the user agreement. Transit discounts will be valid until the last day of the semester and is only valid for enrolled students in any given semester.
When it came to implementing the new card-printing solution, experience and proximity to SFSU's campus were primary factors in the university's decision to select Capture Technologies for the integration. Serving as the systems integrator on the project, the Oakland-based company has previously provided similar solutions to Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority, Mission College, Evergreen College and San Jose City College.
“Capture Technologies provided highly competent consultation and timely support which helped us to recard 30,000 students and launch our new transportation discount program in collaboration with MTA, BART and Clipper/Cubic," adds Gates.
In addition to the new transit pass capabilities, SFSU's Gator Pass OneCard functions as the student ID card and is used for photo identification, meal plan access, declining balance usage, physical access, and library and print/copy services.
In August, Brooklyn College began issuing electronic student IDs as an alternative to the traditional, plastic card. Thanks to the college’s IT department, students can now access the electronic, visual recreation of their ID via the college's BC Navigator app.
According to The Kingsman, digital IDs were created in order to improve the college’s security. Brooklyn College is a commuter campus, but as with any other institution, campus security is a big priority. The electronic IDs contain an image of the student, their full name, the current term, their library ID, and a code that security guards can use for verification purposes.
Mandisa Washington, one of the developers who assisted with the initiative, discussed the benefits of the electronic ID, citing specifically a boost in convenience. “The electronic IDs are essentially validated in real-time. Students need to have their physical ID cards revalidated every semester,” Washington says. “However, the electronic IDs are refreshed a few times per day. Of course, this has made life a bit easier for students and faculty.”
Future plans for the electronic student IDs include more robust verification and event ticketing functionality. For now, though, the digital IDs can only be used at security checkpoints to get onto the college itself. Students cannot yet use their digital ID to get into events that require proof of a student ID card.
“It currently can be used as a visual-only ID,” Washington says. “Students cannot use it to pay for other services. The digital IDs are being used primarily to provide security personnel proof of identity in order to get on campus.”
While the digital IDs have made mandatory campus security checkpoints easier for students, they aren’t expected to replace the school’s physical campus cards anytime soon. The digital ID relies on network access in order to function, so in the event that the app isn’t working, it’s important that students have a physical campus card with them.
There are still some bugs that need to be fixed, and Brooklyn College IT is working to ensure that the BC Navigator app runs as smoothly as possible for the campus community. “We are working to support all of our users, including part-time and full-time students, faculty and researchers,” Washington says. “It’s a large task, considering that over 17,000 students attend the college.”
According to The Excelsior, Brooklyn College’s student newspaper, some students claim that app takes too long to load. However, the college has a website for BC Navigator which details the features of the app, including the digital ID. If students have trouble using the digital, they can refer to the page for possible solutions.
It was only in 2014 that CR80News first covered campus mobile ordering – a then fledgling, student-facing dining solution. At the time, mobile ordering was little more than an explorative service that only a handful of early-adopter campuses had launched.
Over the span of a few short years, though, mobile ordering has become a standard offering on campuses large and small across the country. And spearheading the trend is Tapingo.
Looking back at CR80News’ first coverage of Tapingo, much of the story was speculative, discussing services that were yet to be fully developed. We were dealing in potentialities. But things have since come full circle for both Tapingo and mobile ordering as a service.
[pullquote]The average resident student uses Tapingo three times a week, with many using the app daily.[/pullquote]
After establishing its first inroads on college campuses in 2014, Tapingo has since grown its network to include millions of student users and nearly 200 active campuses across the country – fifty of which now comprise Tapingo’s delivery markets that the company runs itself. That is a significant, market leading number, and it includes some of the largest institutions in the country.
Tapingo’s success – and its ability to add upwards of fifty campuses year on year – can be boiled down to the popularity of the service being provided. Mobile ordering has become a natural and expected service by the modern student, and use of the service has exploded.
“Tapingo has become an active marketplace. The average resident student uses Tapingo three times a week, with many using the app daily,” says Ben Anderson, director of corporate marketing at Tapingo. “It’s become an effective way for universities to consistently engage with their students.”
Anderson estimates that Ohio State University processes some 100 deliveries a day from their on-campus pizza location alone. “When a campus starts to understand the power of the mobile platform and what it can do from a technological perspective, they start to think of ways it can help them solve their real-world problems,” he says.
With usage rates reaching such significant levels, it’s little wonder that campuses across the country have folded mobile ordering into their dining services operations. It’s popular and it also delivers benefits to the food service operator. Managing peak times, improving throughput and refining the customer buying experience are core to the app.
“If you know that there’s a wait time, instead of standing in line wouldn’t you rather sit comfortably at a table studying, and then receive a notification when it’s ready?” Anderson asks. “Mobile ordering has proven many times to be the only way students can grab a last-minute latte while walking onto campus, or between classes. That’s a narrative that we’re hearing all across the country.”
El Camino College's has installed a new copy and print system from Pharos at its Schauerman Library as part of a planned modernization that promised to overhaul student printing.
As reported by The Union, the new system has incorporated automated touch screens that see students swipe their campus cards with a at the machine to access their account and release print jobs. Alternatively, students with $5 or more in their account can release print jobs via an online portal available at the library homepage rather than swipe their ID at the kiosk.
The new Library print webpage provides a step-by-step instructional page on how to navigate the new system, including how to use the add value machines and manage print jobs. In addition to overhauling the in-library print experience, students can also leverage the system to call up a print job from anywhere on campus. The price to print remains unchanged, the path to print has hindered some students.
As with any new deployment, there have been minor growing pains with the new system but library officials expect that working closely with Pharos will help to resolve and troubleshoot any kinks over the coming weeks.
Leveraging the student ID for copy/print is also expected to provide greater protection for student accounts, as the unique card numbers are now attached to print jobs. The cards' magnetic stripe, meanwhile, will be used to release jobs and add value to copy/print accounts via new hardware provided by Ricoh.
The library overhaul consists of five copy machines and six printers. Following the overhaul, El Camino College has no future update plans, as it continues to polish and troubleshoot early kinks with the aim to have the system completely functional by the end of the semester.
Preferred names on campus cards are a regular occurrence at universities across the country. But for students who are seeking to swap out an existing ID for one that bears their new, preferred name, there's often a card replacement fee that the student is responsible for paying.
Now, however, a new initiative at the University of Kansas is subsidizing the replacement fee for students wishing to put a preferred name on a new KU ID card. As reported by The University Daily Kansan, the service is being offered and payed for by the university's Student Senate and the Center for Sexuality and Gender Diversity.
Students wishing to take advantage of the service must first go through an application process for the new student ID card, free of charge. Student Senate will reportedly cover the costs of any applicants specifically in the LGBTQ community.
In the application process, individuals are required to explain the need for the new card to Student Senate so as to ensure students are not "abusing it for the wrong purpose." Students will be required to send a paragraph to the Student Senate detailing their reason for wanting the preferred name and new ID. The application process was outlined on Twitter:
Pleased to announce this new program designed and implemented by Student Senate. Image description available on Facebook. pic.twitter.com/ipxjiBXJDL
— KU Student Senate (@KUSenate) October 8, 2017
KU students students will also have the option to take a new ID photo as part of the process as well, which will used across other university services where student photos are used, including the My KU student account portal.
In order to float the cost of card replacements, Student Senate representatives say that a cut back on office supplies had to be made. The Senate also insists that the money used to cover card replacements will not be taken from funds intended for other student organizations. The replacement cost for lost, stolen or damaged cards at Kansas is $20.
Payment technology provider, Lucova, has announced the general availability of its FIIT POE platform – a point-of-sale register designed to enhance the customer buying experience.
With a focus specifically on the campus market, the university food service and dining retail system supports traditional and cashless payments, as well as features built-in AI for personalized marketing and back office operations. With its new system, Lucova is attempting to turn the point-of-sale formula into what it calls a "Point-of-Experience."
“Everyone is carrying a smart phone but the technology is being wasted,” says Amit Jhas, co-founder and CEO of Lucova. “The FIIT POE platform disrupts the norm with patented beacon sensor technology and AI to take the dining experience to a new level. Finally, it is possible to provide the best experience, improve retention and be profitable.”
FIIT POE has already been deployed on a number of campuses, logging nearly three million transactions last year. The company attributes the number of transactions in part to FIIT POE’s human-centric approach.
A cloud-based solution, the system can also be managed from anywhere and at anytime. Using real-time smart reports, management can also access key insights and information in real time to support customer retention and other goals.
In addition to supporting traditional POS utilities, the FIIT POE platform can also features a built-in messenger service to add a personal touch, the ability to adjust mobile menus, as well as analyze orders and available resources. The system integrates with existing payment processors and points of sale, and is available through a monthly pricing structure with no transaction-based costs.
The system features a patented beacon sensor technology that enables access to customer profiles from a smartphone to provide staff with relevant information to deliver a personalized experience. Rounding out the company's "point-of-experience" vision is customer recognition technology, hands-free and mobile pay, mobile ordering and a user-friendly app.
From the student's perspective the platform -- when paired with a personalized mobile application -- provides a fast and easy way for students to pre-order food, digitize meal cards, check account balances and freely choose between cashless, card and cash transactions. Students can also accrue loyalty point and rewords for their commitment to the campus food service system.
FIIT POE leverages Bluetooth to essentially turn a student's mobile device into smart sensor that interacts with the in-store POS register. In this way, the platform tries to create a better human experience between staff and students by interacting with students' mobile devices through the app. This communication also allows students to conduct a hands free check-in at the dining hall. When the student reaches the FIIT POE register, the student’s name and picture appear on the register's screen right in front of the cashier.With this information, staff can welcome the student with a personal greeting.
The cashier simply clicks on the student's picture and charges the meal to student’s account where the app shows the meal they were just charged for. With auto-confirmation, the charge goes to student’s digital meal card and they can then walk into the dining hall. Later, the student will be prompted via the app to provide a rating and feedback with a single click. This reduces operational friction and allows frontline staff to provide a more personal and unique transaction, while students get the opportunity to give direct feedback.
UCLA students can now choose to print a preferred names on their BruinCards, the university's student ID. The initiative began over the summer and is in full effect for all new and returning students.
As reported by the Daily Bruin, preferred names will be prominently printed on the front of student IDs, while the legal names will still be printed on the back of the cards in accordance with university police policies. UCLA's Undergraduate Students Association Council does, however, have plans to work with relevant campus offices to remove students’ legal names from the BruinCard altogether.
The student council plans to meet with university police officials next month to discuss ways in student university ID numbers can act as the primary form of identification and comply with police policies.
New students to campus this summer were the first to have access to the new policy, having preferred names printed to their BruinCards during orientation. Returning students, meanwhile, have the option to update their card by registering a preferred name through the university's student account portal, MyUCLA, and paying a $5 replacement fee.
Prior to printing preferred names on campus cards, UCLA students previously had the option to use a preferred name on select student records, including class rosters and unofficial transcripts, with prior approval from the registrar’s office. Per UCLA's guidelines, preferred first names are those that a student can elect to use in place of a legal first name on certain university records, as well as the name that the student wishes to be identified by in classroom settings and elsewhere on campus.
UCLA's history with the preferred name dates back to a September 2015 initiative that first allowed for preferred names to appear in place of a legal name on certain university-related records and documents. There remain some records requiring the use of a legal name that have not been included in the preferred name policy, including financial services records, official transcripts, diplomas and official verifications.
The technology may predate the widespread deployment of televisions, but holograms for secure authentication are still standing strong among document security features. And it seems that strength will continue even as digital and mobile ID technologies gain more popularity with governments, financial institutions, corporations, schools and others.
The hologram is still the only technology available today that is able to offer three levels of security – covert, overt and forensic – in a single solution
“The hologram appears to certainly be one of the security features of choice for safeguarding the critical personal data in a passport or on an ID card against tampering, alteration, forgery or counterfeiting,” reads a recent white paper from ITW Security Division entitled “The Hologram—Still Going Strong.” It dates the emergence of the hologram to 1947, with the first ID document containing a hologram debuting in 1984, on the U.N. passport. “Although its use over the years has changed from being the only authentication device used on a banknote or in a secure document to potentially one of a number today, it is by far still the most accepted and admired (document security feature).”
Consider these statistics from ITW:
So what accounts for the continued dependence on this decades-old secure authentication technology even as biometric ID systems gain popularity? Depth and flexibility, says Joanne Ogden, global sales manager for the ITW Security Division. “The hologram is still the only technology available today that is able to offer three levels of security (overt, covert and forensic) in a single solution,” she says. “Hologram manufacturers constantly watch their market to identify the techniques used by counterfeiters and ensure holography integrates additional technology solutions to counter them.”
Even so, holograms face challenges as ID technology and consumer behavior evolve. “The main challenges are for holography to integrate well with other electronic technologies such as mobile ID, and above all remain aware of competing, disruptive solutions and counterfeiting technology,” Ogden says. “By keeping focused on the market place and the problems faced, holographic technology can be adapted to remain truly relevant, protecting documents from counterfeit and aiding authentication.”
Hologram users should replace them with updated versions every five years to ensure the value as a document security feature doesn’t lag from complacency
Adapting to new threats means keeping up with the latest equipment, she adds. “Dot Matrix equipment for producing standard kinetic and colorful holograms is commercially available, so hologram manufacturers invest in the latest manufacturing techniques to produce features such as no color or movement that standard Dot Matrix equipment simply cannot produce,” she says. “Counterfeiters generally only see Level 1 features and therefore do not know about the Level 2 or 3 features, let alone have the ability to try and replicate them.”
Hologram users should replace them with updated versions every five years to ensure the value as a document security feature doesn’t lag from complacency. “Those authenticating holograms look less and less at the detail of the entire hologram as time progresses, and it is in situations like this that would be counterfeiter can try to simulate Level 1 features, often badly, but enough to fool somebody at first glance,” Ogden explains. “Hologram designs need to be kept current and fresh—integrating the latest security features—to ensure they remain the security feature of choice.”
It seems holograms for secure authentication still have a promising future ahead. “Hologram technology will remain strong,” she says. “Digital technology is good and a great add on to physical IDs with hologram technology, but digital technology is complementary rather than a replacement. Digital technology requires power and this leads to issue when power isn’t available. Electricity cuts at border control or no battery power in handheld devices mean authentication applications won’t work.”
To explore the past, present and future of hologram technology and its role as a leading document security feature, check out the free white paper from ITW. It is part of a series of resources on advanced card materials and embedded security features available via the same link. Check it out online.
