The Saint

Story by Tess Foster, Guest Writer

Picture this: You are seated in class in the beautiful Albertus Magnus Hall. Opening up your computer, you are tasked with completing the Duo Mobile two-factor authentication. As you open up your phone it says “SOS,” meaning you are not connected to a cellular network. Just like that, you are unable to use your technology as intended for class. While this is not a totally common occurrence, DUO Mobile has affected students’ ability to learn, and professors’ ability to teach. 

If students are not able to access Course Connect, class notes, their student emails, etc, it can put a real hindrance on their learning due to something that is completely out of their control. When students forget their phone, or cannot access a cellular data connection, it puts them in real distress. Despite these instances, students do not have much other trouble with the two-factor authentication. 

Sophomore Juliana Decker stated, “I like that it helps with security to protect our information, but I just do not like how annoying it is due to how time-consuming it is, and how often you have to log into things.” 

As DUO Mobile has become a part of students’ routine, they have revealed that it is not much of a bother to them. Scott Hopkins went on to say, “For me as a student, I can do it in a few seconds. With an inept professor that is not really familiar with technology, it takes them a while.”

Almost all students can agree that it is hard to watch professors struggle so much with the Duo Mobile two-factor authentication. Amelia Sweet related, “It takes quite a bit of time for my professors to log in. Especially the ones that are not technologically savvy, it takes them a bit longer to start class.” Some students have grown accustomed to the later start times and technology breaks in class. 

Anna Fedewa remarked, “I have noticed in my classes that from time to time, professors get logged out and will have to re-sign in. It is really not much of a disturbance to me, but even then it is a two-minute little reset, so it is kind of like a brain break.”

All in all, as students and professors we understand ITS’ mission to protect our information. I believe we can all agree that getting hacked would cause more of a disturbance to our learning than taking two minutes out of our day for DUO security. However, it is not as simple for everyone as it seems. 

If you or someone you know is interested in writing for The Saint as a guest editor, shoot us an email at thesaint@aquinas.edu. It looks great on a job resume!