https://www.seattletimes.com/business/colleges-are-turning-students-phones-into-surveillance-machines-tracking-the-locations-of-hundreds-of-thousands/
Ah, in fairness it's like 2 universities cited, so not on the scale I was imagining at first. It's basically just an attendance app. And the app contacts the beacon not the other way around - so it's more checking in than being tracked. Just sounds like a new way to check attendance. We had to do sign in with a "clicker" remote device as well.