Professors at Iowa State are doing their homework in order to know their students on a first-name basis.

The 2004-2005 academic year marks the fifth year that professors are able to retrieve student photos online via AccessPlus.

The photos posted on these electronic class lists are the same photos used on ISUCards; professors use them to help match students’ names and faces.

Registrar Kathy Jones said feedback has been positive since professors began accessing the photos online in the fall of 2000.

Advisers have had online access to photos since 1997 in order to become more familiar with advisees.

“Posting photos online is a great retention tool,” Jones said. “It’s good for professors to know students’ first names in an advising setting.”

Many institutions are setting up photo class lists, but Jones said Iowa State was fairy early in providing this service.

Last year, there were approximately 61,500 hits on student photo displays.

Jean Goodwin, assistant professor of English, said she thinks the photo page is a great tool. She said she prints her students’ photos and places them on flash cards. On the back of the cards, she writes an interesting fact about each student that she gets from a profile her students fill out during the first week of classes.

“It helps a lot of people with face-recognition problems like me,” Goodwin said. “It really helps me know who the students are so I can teach them better.”

Goodwin said she was pleased to have this tool when she came to Iowa State two years ago. She didn’t have a resource like this at her previous school, Northwestern University.

“I used to take Polaroids of groups to remember their names,” she said. “This is much more efficient.”

Along with photos, professors have access to directory information like addresses, e-mail addresses, phone numbers and hometowns. Students who do not want this information released may request to withhold it at the Office of the Registrar. Photos, however, are not considered directory information.

“Photos are considered confidential and are only available to those with a need to know or for the purpose of teaching a course,” Jones said.

Faculty must be coded in the AccessPlus system in order to view student photos. Professors can access photos only of students in their classes and advisers can view photos only of their advisees. Faculty members must also pass through a confidentiality reminder screen before they can view photos.

“I have never been aware of a situation where the photos have been used inappropriately,” Jones said.