Continental student ID: Europe moving toward standard, contactless ID

Eugene McKenna, chief executive of campus services at Waterford Institute of Technology in Ireland, has an idea: Create one identification card which all students studying in Europe will be able to use to access services at most European institutions of higher learning. McKenna explains that, today, a student who wants to transfer from one university to another has to carry with him “a folder containing all his academic credits and qualifications.”

This is about to change, reports ContactlessNews. With the pilot program now underway, one student card is all that will be necessary. “It’ll be a student’s secure key to access the information on the server, which will be common to all universities,” says McKenna, who has been one of the driving forces behind this project. The two-year pilot program, expected to kick off next year.

The standardization project is known as the European Education Connectivity Solution and the $2.1 million project was approved for funding by the European Union, which will put up 75 percent. The remainder will come from a consortium of five companies specializing in campus card systems, says McKenna. “We are in the process of validating the companies which are acceptable before EU will release the money,” says, McKenna, chair of the European Campus Card Association’s (ECCA) Standards Committee.

The two-year program will test the validity of standardizing the type of campus card used in European universities is scheduled to begin in January.

Europe-wide standardization of campus cards is the brainchild of the ECCA, founded six years ago. It was modeled after the National Association of Campus Card Users in the United States, and now has more than 500 members representing some 5,000 higher education institutions. “When it was founded in 2002, its main goal was to get standards in place,” says McKenna.

The European campus card system is still in its infancy. “We’re maybe 15-years behind the U.S.,” he says. Europe, however, has been “more aggressive in utilizing advanced technology, such as contactless” as opposed to its U.S. brethren. “When we think of contactless chips, it’s generally accepted that Europe is ahead in that area.”

The card will be based on NXP Semiconductors’ Mifare technology. “If the trial is successful, the system will be licensed to card systems around Europe for various integrators to use,” says McKenna.

Universities will be able to add other applications to the card, says McKenna. For example, if a student wants access control and meal plans on the card, “he brings it to the university and the university will program it for their system.” Other applications could include printing off the Web, online purchases, using the Web to purchase lunch or a pizza, adds McKenna.

One of the beneficiaries of the idea will likely be campus card provider and a consortium member which has a head start is OP Team in Poland. It has already issued some one million student ID cards to 450 universities, colleges, and high schools there. A reseller of Gemalto products, many of the universities are also issuing cards that can be used at other schools in Poland.