Preferred first Name and Personal Pronouns

In 2016 the Title IX Office (now the Office for Institutional Equity) brought up the need for Mines to have the option for students and employees to select a preferred first name. With the most recent onboarding of Banner 9, Mines had the capacity to do so. The Title IX Office convened a group of stakeholders in spring of 2019 to discuss the process for changing someone’s preferred/personal name in Banner (and subsequent push to other derivative systems). In November 2019, the Title IX Office brought together system owners to discuss the project, the process, and their concerns. ITS has been making coding changes to ensure Banner is pushing out Preferred First Name. Banner Self-Service went live in late October 2020, which allowed students and employees the opportunity to add a preferred first name, and their personal pronouns, into Banner via Trailhead. Since fall of 2020, we have been gathering feedback from community members, and the Preferred First Name Project Phase 2 is underway to work through any system glitches and to address systems that were not originally coded to receive preferred first name.

Please note: This project does not include the option to change last names.

Students and employees may determine and designate a preferred first name that they want to be known by in Mines’ systems. Mines reserves the right to remove a preferred first name if it contains inappropriate or obscene language, or if it is being used for misrepresentation. Inappropriate use of a preferred name will be referred to the Dean of Students or Human Resources, respectively.

Acceptable uses of preferred first names include:

• A middle name instead of first name
• An abbreviated name (Manny instead of Emmanuel, Dani instead of Danielle)
• An Americanized name (Wendy instead of Haiyan)
• A name to which you are in the process of legally changing
• A name that better represents your gender identity

The following systems are derivative systems of Banner (they receive regular pushes of information from Banner or the Operational Date Store) and have been coded to receive preferred first name: 

• AIM (Disability Support Services Portal
• Alma (Library Services Platform)
• Academic Works (Scholarship Management Platform)
• BEACON (Academic Advising)
• Bright Horizons (Employee Benefits System)
• Canvas
• Chrome River (Travel/Procurement System)
• Convercent (Conflict of Interest Tracking)
• Directory (Online and Printable)
• FAMIS (Work Order Tracking)
• Fusion (Recreation Center System)
• Heartland (Meal Plan Tracking)
• Okta
• PageUp (Applicant Tracking)
• Skillsoft (Ongoing Learning Platform)
• StarRez (Housing)
• T2 (Parking Permit Portal)
• Team Dynamix (Ticket System for ITS, MAPS)
• TerraDotta (International Student Services and Study Abroad Management Platform)
• Trailhead
• University Tickets (Campus and Athletic Events)

We welcome feedback about how a system displays your preferred first name or your personal pronouns. To submit feedback, please send an email to OIE@mines.edu and include screenshots as well as your concerns. The Office for Institutional Equity will work with ITS to provide the feedback and navigate a resolution and response.

A preferred name will not appear in the following locations, where legal name is required:

• Billing Statements
• Enrollment Verification
• Employment Verifications
• Employment Documentation
• Financial Aid Documents
• Medical Documents
• Official Correspondence with External Entities (Security Clearances)
• Official and Unofficial Transcripts   
• Paychecks/W2/1099T
• Immigration Paperwork
• Court Orders
• Student Record Subpoenas

Also, please note that not every system we use at Mines receives information from Banner. If a system does not receive information from Banner, it will not receive any updates made to one’s preferred name or personal pronouns in Trailhead. Such updates would need to be made by a system administrator in the relevant department.