Truncating a 32 bit value to fit in 16 bits doesn't seem like a good idea.
Now that you have that new id (-10794), it works with if statements, like say good morning to a particular student whereas I could not get anything to happen with the old id (1241765334).
The if statements that you didn't bother to show?
If anyone can tell me what is happening here I would appreciate your comments.
What is happening is that you didn't post all of your code, apparently.