Overview
By nature, Student Success & Engagement includes many different types of users, including users that are assigned both a student role and a staff/faculty role, eg. student workers.
- User Roles are assigned on the Person data feed via the SIS Import and/or in People Administration.
- Student workers can be students that are also employed by the institution, or past students that later became staff/faculty and are still assigned the Student role in SS&E.
- Student workers will always see a Staff View. No matter how or when their student/staff/faculty roles were assigned, as soon as a student worker logs in to SS&E, they will only be able to see a Staff View.
Staff View Settings
- After logging in to SS&E, a Staff View will display for all users that are assigned at least one role that is NOT a student role/function.
- Staff View settings are assigned by the Full Profile View and Limited Profile View settings in Role Administration. These settings determine which tabs and actions are available for non-Student users. For more information about Full Profile View and Limited Profile View Settings, click here.
Student View Settings
- Users that are ONLY assigned a Student role/function are only able to see a Student View.
- Student View Settings are assigned in Role Administration Student View Settings.
User Role/Permission Considerations
Something very important to keep in mind is that user permissions can be assigned from ANY role, and the user's assigned role(s) are what determine if a user will see a Staff View or a Student View after logging in to SS&E.
- What this means is that IF the Student role/function has any non-student permissions checked, if a student is assigned a non-Student role, all permissions set on the non-student role will now apply to the Staff View.
- Depending on what permissions are enabled on the Student role, this may allow the student worker to view information that was not intended to appear on their Staff View.
- It does not matter that "staff/faculty" permissions were enabled on a "student" role. As soon as the student-worker logs in, they will see everything enabled on all of their assigned roles.
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- As long as students are ONLY assigned a student role/function, it does not matter if the Student role includes staff/faculty/non-student permissions, since students will only see a Student View. If logged-in students only see a Student View, any staff/faculty permissions "granted" by the Student role settings would not apply.
- This only becomes a problem when a student becomes a "student worker", i.e. are assigned a non-student role. As soon as the student is assigned at least one non-student role, they will see a Staff View which will allow them to view anything enabled by the Student role.
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Separating Student Worker Permissions
To help manage student worker permissions, some institutions create two separate email addresses for student workers in order to import two separate person records on the Person data feed/SIS Import, each with a different role. This is the only solution that will allow a student worker to view both a Student View and a Staff View.
This allows student workers to log in to SS&E with their "student" email in order to view a Student View; and log in with their "employee" email when they need to view/work in the Staff View.
If student workers have two separate email addresses on separate person Ids, they will see different information displayed on the UI depending on how they log in to SS&E.
- Different SS&E users can have the same name, yet their email address MUST be unique.
- The user's email address is how SS&E knows to check who is logging in in order to:
- Find the user's assigned roles
- Check if the logged in user will see a Student View or Staff View
- Apply (applicable) role permissions.
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- An exception, as noted earlier, is that student/staff permissions enabled on a Student role do not apply IF a student is only assigned the Student role.
- Since students can only log in to the Student View, it wouldn't matter if the student role grants staff/faculty permissions, since this does not apply and will not change anything displayed on the Student View. It only becomes an issue when students are also assigned a staff/faculty role.
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Student/Staff Role Assignment
Roles can be assigned via the SIS Import process or manually within SS&E > People Administration.
- It is recommended to import only one role per person on the Person data feed via the SIS Import process.
- Additional roles should be added in People Administration, either from Bulk Actions or an individual person record > User Details > Add Security Roles.
Click here to learn more about Roles Administration.
How to View Student Worker Permissions
- In Admin > People & Roles > People Administration, search for the student-worker by name/person Id.
- Open their person record, and then click on the Permissions tab.
- The user's assigned roles will display on the user Details tab, and the combined permissions granted by all of the user's assigned roles combined together will display on the user Permissions tab.
- If the student is only assigned a student role, they will only be able to see a Student View when they log in to SS&E. Since staff/faculty permissions assigned by the Student role are only applicable to staff/faculty, this will not change what is displayed on the Student View.
- If a student is also assigned a staff/faculty non-student role, they may potentially see things that were unintentionally enabled for staff/faculty in the Student role permission settings.
Why are staff/faculty permissions enabled on the Student role?
If staff/faculty permissions, eg. Staff View settings, are set to Yes and enabled on a student role/function, the most common reason is that the role settings were copied from another role.
- It is recommended to review Student role(s) permissions on a frequency seen fit to ensure that all non-student staff/faculty settings are disabled.
- There is no use case where Staff View settings should be enabled for a student on a student role.
- As a rule, when setting up a Student role/function, all staff account permissions should be disabled so that they are not unintentionally applied to students that are granted a Staff View.
How to View/Change User Permissions Assigned by All User Roles
Use the Person-Permissions tab to view the exact permissions being applied to a specific user.
- The Permissions tab is Read-Only.
- The Permissions tab displays user-specific permissions after combining these settings from all of the user roles displayed on the Person-Details tab.
- If the Person Permissions tab displays incorrect permissions, the way to fix this is to find which role on the Person Details tab is assigning the "wrong" permission settings and then either remove that role/add a different role instead or edit the role in Role Administration.
NOTE: It's important to keep in mind that editing a role will change the role permissions settings for ALL users associated with the role.
Student Worker Limitation
Currently in SS&E, if a student-staff user (student worker) has only one SS&E login then they can only see a Staff view, and the Student View will not apply to them.
This means that removing settings from the Staff View on all assigned roles will also remove visibility of the student's own Courses/Documents/Profile/Programs/Test Score/Transcript information from their "staff" view.
Meeting Scheduler Example
If a student worker must view student profiles and schedule meetings, the following must be checked on a "staff" role/function:
- Limited Profile View Settings - Show Meetings Tab, Show Profile Tab
- Meetings Can Schedule Meetings For Others
Can See Followers - Student Worker/Staff View
In order for the student worker to NOT see followers listed on other students, the Person Info setting for "Can See Followers" must be unchecked on all user assigned roles displayed on the user's Details tab.
The reason is that "Can See Followers" is only a "staff" permission that does not apply to students. Therefore, if it is checked or unchecked on a student role/function, and the user does not have a non-student role, it will not affect the Student View.
Removing Staff Permissions from Student Roles
A good habit is to regularly monitor and uncheck all staff-only permissions on student roles in Roles Administration so that staff-only permissions will never be unintentionally applied from a non-staff role!
When a user is assigned multiple roles that are both staff and non-staff role/functions, it becomes very important to verify that all non-staff (eg. student) roles are not assigning anything that will change the staff view.
To summarize, General Permissions, Person Info "Can See Followers", and many other items in Role Administration, only apply to staff accounts.
What this means is that if/when these items are checked and enabled on a student role, it is irrelevant, since they do not apply to a non-staff role. However, if a staff/faculty role is ever added to the student record, even if this new role only assigns very limited and restricted "non student" permissions, any staff permissions assigned by the user's student role will now apply!
For this reason we strongly advise to lean on caution and remove all staff permissions from student roles.
Can See Followers - Student View
If the intention is to allow a student to view their staff/faculty Followers in addition to their primary advisor and primary coach, this is not set in Role Administration, and is rather set via Relationship Administration > Subscription Labels > "Student Visible" Yes/No.
Subscription Labels, further explained here, are what determine whether or not subscribers/aka followers are visible to non-staff functions, i.e. students, based on the individual subscription label configuration.
- Institutions can either manually add Subscription Labels in Relationships Administration or import subscription labels from the SIS on the Subscription data feed.
- This is in addition to the subscription label "Staff Follower" which is the default subscription label assigned by SS&E when students are followed within SS&E.
To view all subscription labels that may display for students, go to Admin > Relationships > Subscription Labels, and check which subscription labels show "Student Visible - Yes" in the last column.
- SS&E will only allow students to see followers on their Student View that are associated with a subscription label set to Student Visible "Yes".
- Followers that display on the student record in the Staff View will NOT appear on the Student View if the follower subscription label is set to Student Visible "No". This essentially hides the follower from the student so that the student does not know they are in this person's caseload.
- "Can See Followers" does not apply to non-staff roles, so it does not matter if the Student role shows this checked or unchecked; it will not change what displays on the Student View. For example, if a person record only has the Student role in User Details and their User Permissions tab shows that they "Can See Followers", it does not change anything.
Currently in SS&E, the only way students can view who is following them is by setting "Student Visible" to Yes on the followers Subscription Label.