Over the winter, Campus Security was hard at work implementing a new change: students have now been issued brand-new ID cards. As of this semester, the old ID cards will not work for any of the scanners on campus, and can be disposed of into a black box located in the Mail Services room in the Baugher Student Center.
This mass production project can be accredited to the work of Elizabethtown College’s Information and Technology Services (ITS), Auxiliary Services, and Facilities Management teams. They worked hard to get out the new ID cards for the spring semester.
These new cards sport a new design featuring the blue jay mascot on top of a blue and white background, giving it a more modern-looking design compared to the old cards. One first-year student expressed disappointment over the aesthetics of her new card. “It looks boring now. I don’t know why they felt the need to change it; I liked the photo on the old one.” The photo, of course, refers to the bird’s-eye-view of the front of the BSC that can be seen on the old cards.
Because a card had to be printed for each of the campus’s students– which amounts to more than 1600 pieces of plastic technology– no picture retakes will be offered until further notice.
The appearance of the new cards may be controversial, but a fact that most people agree on is that these new cards just don’t scan as well as the old ones. “I used to be able to scan into my dorm by holding my bag up against the scanner, but now I have to take it out, which is kind of annoying,” says a second-year student.
Truthfully, the new ID cards and scanners are not as sensitive as the old versions, so they have to be held closer together and take longer to register. Several students have also mentioned that the beep to confirm a scan is quieter than it was before, which makes it hard to tell if a scan has registered.
So, why was this change implemented? Joe Hudzick, the Senior Director of Auxiliary Services, says that the old cards raised security concerns. “While Etown College has been fortunate to have not experienced any major security issues related to our ID card system,” he says, “nationally it was becoming more commonplace at colleges and universities using the proximity card technology, which was our old system.” If colleges that still use proximity card technology start reporting security issues, it will not raise as much concern for Etown’s cybersecurity in the short term.
Many have wondered why this big transition happened over winter break. After all, the summer break is much longer than the winter break, and it just makes sense to start out the new school year– instead of the new calendar year– with the new ID cards.
Summer is actually a much busier time of year for Etown staff than winter, according to Hudzick. “This project required collaboration from multiple departments, and winter break worked best for all their project schedules.” There is a lot to be done over summer break, making winter the perfect time to rally the crowd and complete a large technological task. Summer also attracts a lot of guests, such as prospective students, so not much could have gotten done then.
No matter how you feel about this new change, it was an impressive feat on the part of the involved organizations to implement the new ID system in such a short amount of time.
If you have any questions about the new cards, please feel free to send an email to Etown’s locksmith, Jeff Williams.
