1.2.1 Student and faculty perspectives on learning analytics use

While there is evidence that students inherently trust higher education institutions to use their data appropriately (Slade et al., 2019), they also express strong privacy preferences regarding those data:

Survey questions addressing students’ overall feelings about privacy revealed that students almost universally considered privacy to be important, especially to protect against intrusions in their life (94%) and to develop their identity (79%) and, to a lesser degree, to develop intellectual ideas (71%) and personal relationships (68%).

(Asher et al., 2022)

The curriculum developed across these chapters is built with these perspectives in mind and will provide guidance and tools for meeting students’ expectations for appropriate uses of their data.

 

 Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, & Justice tip

An awareness that their data are being captured can prevent vulnerable students from pursuing the services they may need to succeed. In the words of one student:

But I could also see certain things that are tracked, maybe being a little embarrassing. I initially didn’t go [to the counseling center] for a long time because I was embarrassed, because I knew that the university was going to be able to track that and look at my record and say, “Oh yeah, she’s been going to counseling.” And maybe if they wanted to, they could somehow find out what exactly it was that I was talking to the therapist about.

(Jones, K. M., 2019)

Creating transparency around when we are and aren't using certain data, and to what purposes they're being used, can help ensure that our students pursue the resources we make available to support their success.