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--- 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.