All guides
Separation

Encounter Detection: who crossed paths

Find the students who were out at the same time, for the same place — the tool for “who was with them?”

For leadersVero help

Encounter Detection finds pairs of students who have been out of class at the same time, more than once. It is the tool for the question that used to be unanswerable: who was he with?

The Vero Encounter Detection view listing anonymised student pairs, usual destinations and overlap counts
Pairs, how often their passes overlap, and their usual destination.

What counts as an encounter

Two students holding open passes whose times overlap. Vero lists a pair only once it has happened at least twice — a single overlap is coincidence in a school of a thousand people, and listing it would bury the signal.

Using it

  1. Set the window. Past 30 days is the default. Widen it when you are looking at something that has been building over a term.
  2. Search for a student if you already have a name — the list narrows to pairs involving them.
  3. Filter by destination. Two modes, and the choice matters:
    • Exclude these destinations — drop the noise. Excluding Main Office and IT Services removes overlaps that are just two students queueing at a counter.
    • Show only these destinations — narrow to one question. Bathroom only, for a vaping investigation.

Reading the results

Each row is a pair, an encounter count, and the dates and times they overlapped. What matters is the shape, not the number:

  • Same time each day — a routine, not a coincidence.
  • Same destination every time — worth combining with a bathroom or vaping question.
  • Clustered in one week — something happened that week.
  • Scattered across a term at random times — probably two students who are simply out a lot.

What it is good for

  • After an incident. Vandalism at 11:20 in the west block — who had a pass at 11:20?
  • Vaping. Repeated bathroom overlaps between the same names, at the same time of day.
  • Checking a separation is working. If a Separation group is doing its job, that pair should stop appearing.

Using it responsibly

This screen names children next to a suspicion. Two rules keep it useful and fair:

  • Start with a question, not a browse. Come here because something happened, not to see what turns up.
  • Corroborate before acting. An overlap is a prompt to ask, never an answer. Talk to the students.