Verifying Student Identity
Policy
Utah Tech University has policy in place to guide efforts in verifying student identity (See Section 4.5.5 of University Policy 601). “Faculty members must verify that a student who registers for an online course is the same student who participates in and completes the course. Two or more student verification methods must be used…” (See University Policy Addendum 601C Online Student Verification, approved 29 April 2022.]
State Authorization Reciprocity Agreement (SARA)
Utah Tech University is an approved SARA institution within the state of Utah, which is a member of the National Council for State Authorization Reciprocity Agreement (NC-SARA). See https://academics.utahtech.edu/state-authorization/. SARA is a voluntary regional compact that helps ensure “more efficient, consistent, and effective regulation of distance education across state lines,” including guidelines for student identity verification (SARA Policy Manual 22.1).
Multi-Factor Authentication
Starting 1 February 2023, the University migrated from DUO Security to Microsoft Authenticator to more affordably and still securely require ALL employees and ALL students to login to University systems, including Canvas courses, using multi-factor authentication. For more information about the change in multi-factor authentication, see https://help.utahtech.edu/kb/article/151-mfa-change-faq/.
Proctorio Remote Proctoring
The University supports the use of Proctorio, a remote proctoring service to secure online exams. In 2020, Utah Tech joined the Utah System of Higher Education (USHE) consortium software contract for Proctorio for University-wide implementation in Fall 2020. The Identity Verification in Proctorio facilitates verifying the identity of students at the beginning of online exams. The University Testing Center coordinates Proctorio use for online instructors and students. (See https://testing.utahtech.edu/proctorio-setup-within-canvas/.)