--- Forwarded Message from [log in to unmask] ---

>Date: Fri, 2 May 2003 17:24:06 -0400
>From: [log in to unmask]
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: Re: #7135 lab attendance tracking

We have kept track of lab usage for thirty-two years.

I have found the data useful in defending budgetary
requests, staffing increases and lab renovations.
We use the stats also to see emerging trends: e.g.
which departments are sending students to use
materials or what operational changes have promoted
increased usage. We based some of our billing on
the data, too, for departments and programs that
pay for lab services because they fall outside
our normal service group.

Our current system uses 4th Dimension for the Mac,
a program we adopted in 1989 and have successfully
customized to our needs over the years. With it,
we do all our library cataloguing and circulation
tracking. It is a very robust relational database
that we now also use to serve library data via web.

http://glc.bu.edu:8080

All programs in our collection are barcoded. When
users show, we scan the material/barcode, which
pulls up title & call#. We scan the user ID card
with a stripe reader, which pulls up the name,
college of registration, and whatever courses
they are enrolled in which we think might have
brought them to the lab. (We download the expected
user pool at the start of the semester, from the
registrar's database, and then add the unexpected
as they appear). The record is automatically
date/time stamped. When the material is returned,
we scan the barcode; this closes out the record.

Aside from the uses listed above, we routinely consult the
circulation data any time something turns up missing. We
know who checked it out last, and when.

We generate reports once or twice a semester for faculty.
We consider the data on 'seat time' and individual student
attendance to be confidential and do not release this type
of info to faculty except under limited circumstances.
(We only give student-specific data if the faculty
member is basing grades on attendance, in which case
students have to be notified in advance of the intent.)

Bruce Parkhurst
Geddes Language Center
Boston University



Items displayed in the window are not for sale.