First e-mail to be sent to selected students after course
enrollment
Subject Line Suggestion: Important Exam Info
Greetings,
One of the courses you signed up for (
xxx-XXX-XX – Course Name
) requires students to
participate in a new security system. This new software system is used to verify a students’ ID
using just your mouse, touchpad, stylus or finger. This unique technology is from a company
called Biometric Signature ID (BSI).
Your instructor will be asking you to verify your identity as an assignment in the
BioSig-ID Registration link found under course home.
You will also be asked to complete a
Practice Authentication assignment before you begin your first authenticated exam. You
need to follow the instructions found within the BioSig-ID Registration to enroll and
verify your identity.
Key highlights are:
1.
You will be asked to watch a short video then register and enroll in the software system.
Please view video here:
http://youtu.be/psUxrA2Slew
, or on the BioSig-ID Registration
page in your class.
It is critical that you watch this video before authenticating your
identity.
It is a good idea to create a signature that is simple to remember and recreate. Do
NOT forget what you used for your signature – you will need it for every exam.
2. You will receive a one practice authentication assignment after your authentication
registration to verify your identity before taking your first exam using authentication in
this course. This should take 10-15 seconds, and authentication will take 10-15 seconds
before every exam.
3. The total estimated time will be approximately 15-30 minutes during the entire evaluation
period.
4. You will be one of the first students at Iowa CC to have access to dynamic biometric
technology using signature biometrics and will be asked to participate in a user survey
after your course.
5. Any questions please call toll free 1-800-970-8228, or e-mail eCollege Technical Support
at
helpdesk@iowacconline.com
or through the Tech Support Tab in the course.
We thank you for your dedication to this new technology – it will be fun and
you will be on the frontline with a new software technology!
Second e-mail - Reminder e-mail (Optional)
Repeat the first e-mail, 1 day after the first one goes out - two times total or more as required
after assessing the student participation levels.
Third e-mail for students after successful enrollment
Subject Line Suggestion:
Important info from Iowa CC administration
Greetings,
Thank you for registering, enrolling and validating your identity using the BioSig-ID technology.
3
During our course, it is required that you verify your identity with the BioSig-ID software before
every exam. You must use the same signature (characters/letters) used during registration
/enrollment. Your signatures will be compared using technology for a match.
Use your best efforts each time you verify
as the Iowa Consortium will summarize all student
successes using the signature biometrics.
If you have questions, please call the eCollege helpdesk, toll free at 1-800-970-8228, or chat
with a helpdesk technician in the Tech Support Tab in our course.
5
Contents
Contents ... 5
BioSig-ID Integration ... 5
Course Based Registration Link ... 6
Course Based Dashboard ... 8
ID Verification Prompt ... 8
Frequently Asked Questions ... 10
Escalation Path ... 10
Appendix A ... 11
The Pearson LearningStudio platform has built out an extensible ID verification subsystem which allows for interchangeable ID verification providers. The ID provider workflows described within this document is for verifying user identity against the Bio-Sig ID system. The existing integration pieces included within the integration are as follows:
Integrated user registration workflow to allow for users to register a BioSig-ID account from within the LearningStudio system.
Instructor facing control dashboard to allow professors/teaching assistants or administrators to choose which exams to leverage ID verification.
Exam facing course interrupts that prompt users to complete ID verification before accessing the corresponding exam.
Support for gating or not gating access to course exams based on the outcome of the student identity verification process.
Campus based custom error messaging that can be defined globally for the campus as well as support for custom messages sent back from the ID verification provider.
7
As a prerequisite, user’s must register their biometric ID with the ID verification provider before accessing a given course exam. No additional campus configuration is needed for this piece with the only requirement being that a professors or course content authors will need to place the outbound SSO links for the registration component within the courses using the integration. Please note that at this point a course must have an associated course call number in order to successfully launch the course based registration process.
The base link used for the registration link is as follows: http://outboundsso.next.ecollege.com/default/launchWithoutCache.ed?ssoType=BioSig-ID. An example implementation using the base outbound SSO link is as follows:
<SCRIPT language=javascript> function OpenGlobalSSO() { window.open("http://outboundsso.next.ecollege.com/default/launchWithoutCache.ed?sso Type=BioSig-ID", "_self"); } </SCRIPT> <SCRIPT language=javascript>OpenGlobalSSO();</SCRIPT>
Once the registration link is placed within the course, the registration process illustrated in the following screen will display for the user which will allow the user to register their biometric signature and have it associated to their user account.
Course Based Dashboard
Included within this integration is the ability to leverage course based controls to allow professors and administrators to explicitly choose which exams to leverage the selected ID verification provider. The base link used for the course based control dashboard is as follows “http://idverification.next.ecollege.com/Dashboard/Dashboard.ed”. An example implementation using a simple JavaScript command is included below for reference puropses:
<SCRIPT language=javascript> function OpenDashboard() { window.open("http://idverification.next.ecollege.com/Dashboard/Dashboard.ed", "_new"); } </SCRIPT> <SCRIPT language=javascript>OpenDashboard();</SCRIPT>
Please note that the control dashboard must be set as a HIDDEN CONTENT ITEM, within the course to prevent student user access. Once set up you will see a screen similar to the one shown below which will allow the user to select and save which exams to leverage ID verification for. Please note that at this time the exam selection is not carried over during the course copy process and will need to be set each time by the adopting professor.
9
Current support for ID verification prompts is around course examinations only. Once an exam has been enabled to use ID verification, the following screen will be presented to given student user once they navigate to access a given course exam. Please note that this prompt occurs before the user accesses the given exam and will not impact the user’s time for time based exams.
Once ID verification has been completed by the student, and if the user fails ID verification and the campus has chosen to leverage gating for the campus the user will be blocked from accessing their exam and will be presented with a screen similar to the one shown below. The existing error message is broken in to two parts: (i) the “This message comes from the EP specific config file” message is the static portion of the error for which a given campus can choose what standard messaging to display (student support team to contact, etc.) and (ii) the second part of the message “Please contact the support team for further details” is the dynamic part of the message that is returned from the BioSig system and can be tailored as needed in coordination with BioSig for a given campus.
Frequently Asked Questions
Summarized below are highlights of frequently asked questions in regards to the ID verification integration with BioSig:
Question: What unique ID is used as part of the integration?
Answer: As part of the ID verification subsystem within LearningStudio, user ID and email address are sent out as part of the registration and ID verification prompts for exams. At this time BioSig ID is keying off of email address so please note that for user updates to existing email addresses after registration will result in user’s being recognized as new users within the BioSig system.
Question: Currently what areas of the course can be enabled for use in ID verification?
Answer: As it stands today, just course exams can be enabled to use ID verification but we are exploring extending this capability to other areas of the course (threaded discussion area, dropbox, etc.).
Escalation Path
The escalation paths for this integration break out in to two paths – Pearson eCollege escalation paths and then the associated BioSig escalation paths. For Pearson eCollege, please use the following escalation paths –
11
o For all student or faculty level issue reports
Pearson eCollege Client Services Representative
o For any administrator level questions or issue reports
For the BioSig-ID system please self-service customer online help portal listed below –
http://support.biosig-id.com/home
Appendix A
Campus Configuration Checklist
[ ] License Agreement signed for use of the integration
[ ] Decision to gate student access or not based on ID verification success If gating is enabled:
[ ] Support procedures finalized between campus and BioSig support teams [ ] Campus level error messaging finalized and passed along to eCollege [ ] Any customized error messaging finalized with BioSig
[ ] End to end test completed within a test course on campus to verify connectivity [ ] Registration link and hidden dashboard link added to adopting courses