New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo is seeking information about contracts that colleges and universities in the state have with card issuers as part of an investigation into deceptive marketing tactics, according to AmericanBanker.com.

The office sent letters to approximately 300 schools questioning any exclusive contracts that they may have with debit and credit card issuers. The investigation stems from a nationwide investigation into the student loan industry the office started in 2007.

Schools have agreed with issuers to market affinity cards to alumni associations and students “with little or no evaluation of the terms or rates of the cards that could be marketed to students,” said Cuomo. 

The American Civil Liberties Union is questioning Contra Costa County, Calif. on their implementation of a microchip-tracking program in their preschool centers, according to the California Watch.

Contra Costa’s tracking initiative called Child Location, Observation and Utilization Data System, or CLOUDS for short, assigns students a shirt that has a small locator chip sewn into the chest area. Parents can digitally sign in students after being dropped off at the beginning of the day, at which point the tracking device sends a signal to a computer in the administrative office.

Each child is seen in real time as a moving dot on the screen, and if a child strays out of its assigned area, an alert is sent to the teacher. 

The University of Incheon in South Korea has automated its library operations with RaceTrack high-frequency RFID tags from UPM Raflatac coupled with a library automation solution from ECO.

With the new RFID-enabled library automation solution, the university’s 10,000 students will receive faster book circulation, as well as self-service check-in/out stations. The RFID solution also enables students to use their credit cards for library transactions, eliminating the need to carry a library patron card. 

Ingersoll Rand Security Technologies, provider of security solutions and manufacturer of Schlage contactless smart credentials and readers, have entered into a partnership with ScreenCheck International which will let customers design, encode, print and manage its card population through ScreenCheck’s BadgeMaker Online software.

This new partnership will grant ScreenCheck, developer of smart card software solutions, access to Schlage’s portfolio of credentials to provide customers expanded options for card personalization and printing.  

Grove City College, Pa, and PNC Bank have formed a relationship to give personal banking products and services to more than 2,900 students, faculty and staff.

As of part of the arrangement, students, faculty and staff will have the option to link their Grove City College photo ID card to a PNC account, adding ATM and purchasing functionality to the campus cards already used for daily activities, such as entering residence halls, checking out library books and accessing meal plans. 

Indianapolis-based Harrison College has become the latest higher education institution to sign up with financial services provider Higher One, New Haven, Conn., to distribute refunds to its students.

Higher One will use its OneDisburse Refund Management system to provide the refunds. A file including student names and the total amount of each refund will be sent from Harrison to Higher One. Students have several ways to receive their refunds including direct deposit. Students will have access to mobile alerts, email notifications and the ability to pay their bills online. Parents also are able to deposit money onto the student’s card.  

Loyola University, Chicago, is offering more buying power for its students through the campus card program, allowing them for the first time to take the card off-campus at local dining establishments. The program will start small, focusing on a handful of restaurants.