“When you look back in 20 years, you’re not gonna have an ID to put in your scrapbook, and I feel like that does take away from the [university] experience,” said Cael Liebl, a fourth-year student at MacEwan University.
Samara Murray, another fourth-year student, is still holding onto her physical ID. She said the picture on her ID is about four years old. “I’m not changing it,” she said. “It’s just gonna stick with me for the rest of my school year.”
“I’m not changing it. It’s just gonna stick with me for the rest of my school year”
— Samara Murray, MacEwan student
For students like Liebl and Murray, their student IDs are as much a memento of their time at MacEwan as they are a way to check something out from the library.
When MacEwan introduced its digital ID system in October 2025, The Griff reported on questions surrounding student consultation and why a new system was necessary in the first place. Now, a year later, some students say they still want their physical cards for reasons ranging from reliability to sentimental value.
In a statement to the Griff, the university explained that physical cards are not being phased out for students who want to keep them. They said that the university will continue to support both the old-style cards and the newer physical cards printed at the Technology Support Desk.
The Griff reported last October that David Almond, MacEwan’s associate vice-president (information systems) and chief information officer, did not say when support for the old IDs would end.
A statement on MacEwan’s website saying “old ID will function for a few months” was posted in error and has since been removed.
Beyond nostalgia, students have other issues with the new digital system.
Ava Bendick, a second-year student, has both versions of the ID and said the physical one is more reliable.
She said she has had issues getting into the gym with her digital ID. “It won’t scan off my phone,” she said. “I try to put it [on the scanner], and it takes so long for it to actually work.”
Samantha Simbulan, a second-year MacEwan student, said the digital ID is inconvenient. “It would be nice to have a physical one, just to have it on me, because sometimes my phone will be dead, or I’m not accessible to my phone at times.”
Simbulan also said she has missed out on student discounts because her phone was dead and she had no other student ID to show.
Emery Davies, who was interviewed for The Griff’s original story, raised a similar concern about dead phones in a comment on a MacEwan Facebook post announcing the new IDs. The university replied that physical cards would still work “everywhere on campus”.
The university said that any active students and alumni can still get physical cards through Technology Support services, and both versions can be used for the same services without limitations.
