These guidelines are about how teachers should relate to streaming and recording classes in relation to the GDPR when making recordings available to students on Blackboard and Panopto. The guidelines apply from spring 2021 and will be updated from autumn 2021 with a more durable format.
Blackboard
Blackboard is AU'S current Learning Management System, in which all courses have an associated course forum. Here, it is possible to upload recorded videos to the course forum itself in Blackboard, but it is also possible to embed videos that have been uploaded to AU's new video platform Panopto, for which an integration solution has been developed.
Panopto
Panopto is AU's new video platform, enabling better use of video during classes. Via Panopto, teaching staff can both securely and easily record and share video material from their own computers, and engage the students in the videos via quizzes, debates and automatic indexing, for example. In addition, Panopto makes it possible to record and stream classes from large lecture rooms and theatres.
Panopto has been integrated with Blackboard, which means that video material from Panopto can be played in the course forums in Blackboard.
If teachers stream and/or record classes in which no one, or only the teacher, appears on the screen, teachers themselves can decide how the material is to be used. If material is shown – images, slides, text extracts, etc. – the teacher must take account of other people's copyrights. However, the teacher has full access to streamed or recorded materials.
If the class is part of a planned course of study, and recordings and streaming of the class are uploaded to the associated course forums in Blackboard to which only students on the course and the teacher have access, it is not necessary to obtain consent from the students to stream or record the class. On the other hand, the recordings must not be made available to anyone other than the course participants in the course forum in Blackboard.
As a teacher, you must always inform your students that the class is being recorded. This is a requirement in the GDPR, which in spring 2021 will be met via a joint message on the front page of Blackboard.
Special information regarding active participation
If the curriculum requires active participation through student presentations, the student will have to give the presentation, even though the presentation is being streamed and recorded. The teacher decides whether a presentation should also be recorded and uploaded in the course forum in Blackboard. Remember only the participants on the course and the teacher have access to the course forum.
As a general rule, all class recordings/streaming should be uploaded to the course forums in Blackboard. If you want to make a streaming video or a recording containing identifiable students available outside the course forum in Blackboard or in Panopto, you will need active consent from the students. If consent is not obtained, it is not possible to use the material outside the course forum.
Anyone who has consented to participate in a streaming video or a recording may withdraw their consent. If a recording of the class is available outside the class course forum in Blackboard or Panopto, the teacher must remove the relevant recording if consent is withdrawn.
| Requirement to obtain consent | Requirement to delete recording | |
|---|---|---|
| Recordings of the teacher only | No | No |
| Recordings of other persons, but uploaded in the class course forum in Blackboard or in Panopto. | No | Delete after the end of the semester |
| Recordings of other persons uploaded outside the class course forum in Blackboard or in Panopto. | Yes | Delete if consent is withdrawn |
After the end of the semester, AU is obligated to delete recordings in the course forum in Blackboard if specific persons can be identified and no consent has been obtained. If consent has been given for the recording to be used or if there are no people in the recording, there is no requirement to delete the recording.
A teacher can always edit, correct and delete teaching material in a course forum in Blackboard. The teacher is entitled to do this without further consent in the relevant course forum during the current semester.
Students may neither record classes nor share their teacher’s recordings of classes from a course forum in Blackboard or on Panopto without consent from teachers and fellow students. If a student requests to record the class as part of the academic assistant scheme, as a general rule, the teacher should give consent, unless exceptional circumstances prevent this.
Recording or sharing classes by students without consent is a breach of the university's rules and regulations and a violation of teachers’ copyrights. Breaches of the rules and regulations are handled in accordance with AU's disciplinary rules.