What are the LearnPlatform by Instructure Browser Extensions?

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Designed to give K-12 leaders insights into student edtech access, the LearnPlatform Browser Extensions allow administrators to know what edtech products are being used in their organization. The extension collects information about domains associated with apps or sites in the LearnPlatform product library.

The information collected via the browser extension is never used to identify any specific student; rather it provides data to help schools and districts understand and improve how technology supports teaching and learning.

Note: The extension is not designed or intended for individual student use and should only be installed as part of a school or district initiative.

Educator vs. Student Browser Extensions

There are two LearnPlatform browser extensions; one for educators and another for students. These are simply used to identify whether the incoming usage data should be attributed to an educator or student user.

To get the installation guide, please contact support-lp@instructure.com.

LearnPlatform Browser Extensions Data Usage

Once installed on a user's browser and that user visits a site that is included in our product library, the extension activates and captures information. The LearnPlatform icon changes from gray (inactive) [1] to colored (active) [2]. When the extension is activated, it collects general usage information.

This can include:

• A school-provided user ID
• The time of day
• Information about the domain and website

Notes:

• The LearnPlatform browser extensions only collects data from edtech products found in the LearnPlatform community library. It ignores data from products outside of the LearnPlatform Library.
• LearnPlatform is compliant with all federal and state student data privacy and confidentiality laws. Instructure is also a signatory of the Student Data Privacy Pledge. Access to reports, dashboards, and insights is secure and verified, and uses industry leading encryption and protection methods to defend against any malicious activities across the organization.
• For more information about the privacy and security practices related to the browser extension and LearnPlatform, please visit our Privacy Center.

FAQs

How do I make sure the LearnPlatform browser extension is pulling data?

Make sure that:

• Students and educators are logged into their institution’s Google account while using the Chrome browser.
• Students and educators are accessing products via Chrome as a browser.
• Your organization's student and faculty/staff domains are included in our system for your usage to match your organization. If you have not done so, send your faculty/staff domains to support-lp@instructure.com and the LearnPlatform team will add them to the system.
• The browser extension is active when accessing an educational product.

What user data is collected and transmitted by the LearnPlatform browser extensions?

For Educators

• A GSuite identifier, typically an active email address (used only on the backend of the platform).
• A notification of point of access for published edtech products.

Note: If you have provided a roster, a name will also be visible in the Educator Usage Details table of the Inventory Dashboard.

If you have provided a roster but you don’t want the names to be visible in the Inventory Dashboard, you can hide the Educator Usage Details in the Settings tab [1]. In the Account Settings section, click the Access Controls tile [2].

In the Configure Access page, go to the Educator Usage Details section then click the Yes radio button. To save the changes, click the Apply button [2].

For Students

• A GSuite identifier, typically an active email address (used only on the backend of the platform).
• A notification of point of access for published edtech products.

All student data is aggregated at the school or district level and is currently not available by name, class, course, etc. No personally identifiable information is shared in the Inventory Dashboard.

Is the data collected for Educators, Staff, or Students?

The customer decides which organizational units (OUs) are connected to the browser extensions. The extensions can be installed for educators and/or staff (using the educator extension) or students (using the student extension).

Is data transmitted from the customer to LearnPlatform?

Data is transmitted through organization-level GSuite educators/students who are authenticated with their credentials and are using a Chrome browser on any non-mobile device.

Stored and Used Data

For more information on stored and used data, visit the LearnPlatform | Instructure Data Processing Agreement.

What is the recommended organizational unit (OU) structure for installing the extension to only one group (students or teachers)?

The below approach helps the deployment of an extension to the educator OU, enabling all teachers at all schools to get it, but no students.

• Educators
  • District 1
    • School A
    • School B
    • School C
• Students
  • District 1
    • School A
    • School B
    • School C

The reverse applies to students.

The below approach makes it harder to deploy the extension since you cannot use a single OU, but instead must select each one individually.

• District 1
  • School A
    • Educators
    • Students
  • School B
    • Educators
    • Students
  • School C
    • Educators
    • Students

It is recommended to group only the teachers/students into a hierarchy of only teachers/students and the remaining group into a separate hierarchy. This is so you can pick the highest organizational unit to target the most users of a specific group.

Troubleshooting

I'm not seeing data in my dashboard

Once you have completed each step of the installation process, it may take up to two business days to verify your organization and domains and for data to flow into your Inventory Dashboard.

Here are some of the common errors and solutions:

• The extensions may have been pushed by error to the incorrect organizational units (OUs). Double check your installation steps to ensure that the right extensions have been installed for the right OUs.
• You may have not forced installed the extension. The LearnPlatform for Educators extension should be force installed to your Teacher/Educator group (organizational unit) and the LearnPlatform for Students extension should also be force installed to your Students group (organizational unit). If you have decided to allow install the browser extensions (typically due to a district guideline) instead of force install, make sure to promptly communicate this with your teachers. If end users choose not to install the extension, it will not collect data for those educator accounts. Kiosk mode does not run any forced installed G Suite extensions.
• LearnPlatform may need your domains. Your organization's student and faculty/staff domains need to be included in our system for your usage to match your organization. To add it to the system, send your faculty/staff domains to the LearnPlatform team via support-lp@instructure.com.
  • If you have pushed the extensions before sending LearnPlatform your domains, contact support-lp@instructure.com and the support team will make the necessary corrections in the backend for your data to appear.
• Students and educators are not logged into their Google accounts while using the browser (e.g. via an incognito window). Make sure that students and educators are logged into their Google accounts when accessing a web-based edtech product. Only then we can associate their usage data with your organization.
• Students and educators are not accessing products via Chrome as a web browser. The LearnPlatform browser extension will not capture any data from web-based edtech products that are accessed via non-Chrome browsers like Mozilla Firefox, Opera, Safari, and others. For Microsoft Edge, contact support-lp@instructure.com for instructions. In addition, the browser extensions currently do not collect usage for non-web-based products and applications.
• Chrome Sync should be enabled for the extension to capture data.

The browser extension is not pulling data for a specific product

LearnPlatform tracks product usage from the domain of a web-based product. The browser extension will not track usage for a particular tool if that tool has a custom domain or if our system has a different domain from what your organization is using to access that product. If you intend to track usage for a particular product, our support team may be able to include that domain for you.

LearnPlatform will not create products to track specific custom domains. For example, LearnPlatform will track the product Khan Academy and all sub domains from khanacademy.org, but will not create the product Khan Academy - Springfield School District to match the organization's custom/vanity domain.

To confirm that the browser extension is not pulling usage data from a product, visit the site for that product and check at the LearnPlatform browser extension to see if it is active or not.

If you want to make sure that your LearnPlatform browser extension pulls data for a particular site, send the following information to support-lp@instructure.com:

• Subject (optional): Add domain for a LearnCommunity Tool
• Product Name
• Product URL

Please allow for up to 48 business hours for the extension to pull data for that particular product.