Who Needs to Know? part II

A continnum of my post http://3rseduc.blogspot.com/2013/06/who-needs-to-know.html............

There is rumor of"opt-out" to CCSS and the LDS data collection, and I have heard many anecdotes of parents whose information is collected without permission. A well known example would be the iris scanning incident (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2336020/Parents-angered-schools-conduct-Minority-Report-like-iris-scans-students-young-asking-permission.html). However, supposedly law is in place to prevent such things,

"The Fair Information 
Practice of Transparency calls for “providing 
notice to the individual regarding the collection, 
use, dissemination, and maintenance of personally 
identifiable information” (NIST 2010 Special 
Publication 800-122, p. D-2, 3)."

This links to FERPA which was changed in 2011 (after publication of this document) which is referenced here http://dianeravitch.net/2013/04/08/why-is-the-us-department-of-education-weakening-ferpa/ and http://www2.ed.gov/policy/gen/guid/fpco/pdf/sealea_overview.pdf to cite a few sources.

But don't fear, folks....

"A school or district is also required to provide an 
annual Directory notice, if directory information 
is disclosed without consent. The school or district 
may choose to combine their annual FERPA 
notification with their annual Directory notice. 
Directory information includes information 
contained in a student’s education record that 
would not generally be considered harmful or an 
invasion of privacy if disclosed. The Directory 
notice must describe the specific types of 
information the school or district has designated 
as directory information, and the parent’s right to 
opt out of disclosure of directory information. In 
the case of postsecondary institutions, these rights 
accrue to the student."

Of course, I have worked in schools and perhaps I'm out of the loop and was out of the loop as data and assessment coordinator but I've never seen this directory or heard mention of it. I hope exists but my guess is it is published in the district office and sits in a binder; no one is ever notified of it, the fact that it is law is apparently enough notification.

Collecting data is, again, supposedly a very public motion with an opt-out program but it isn't quite that cut and dry. All the info you submit when enrolling a child (ie a photo id of parents, utility bills, birth certificate) are all "mandatory" for enrollment and often end up in the data systems. I mean, I guess that is common sense but parents often do not think of it as such, and they are not alerted to the collection and use of the data past enrollment purposes.

"The Pupil Protection Rights Act requires parental 
notification if a study to be conducted in a school 
includes any information or questions about the 
student or the student’s family related to the eight 
identified sensitive topics: political affiliations or 
beliefs; religious practices, affiliations, or beliefs; 
mental and psychological problems; sex behavior 
or attitudes; illegal, anti-social, self-incriminating If the study is funded by the U.S. Department of 
Education, schools and contractors must obtain 
written parental consent before minor students 
can be required to participate in the study. If the 
school received funds from the U.S. Department of 
Education, school districts are required to provide 
an annual schedule of the specific or approximate 
dates of all other surveys with a notification of 
the parents’ right to request and review a copy of 
the survey before it is administered and to decide 
that their child will not participate, reagrdless 
of the survey’s source of funding. Under this 
Act, parents must also be notified each year of 
their right to decide whether or not their child 
will participate in activities that make student’s 
personal information available for marketing or 
other profit-making activities."

Again, I have yet to see these "notifications" and keep hearing from parents of breech of this law/procedure.

Things often get lost in "legalese" and below you can see that permission to use a student's data is permissible   without notification when sharing with school officials and other designated entities with legitimate educational interests. What might that mean? I have yet to get an answer and suspect it could mean volunteers, government organizations (i.e. dept of health), testing companies, think tanks, researchers, textbook companies, and corporations.

"The annual FERPA notice provides information 
about permissible uses of PII in education records. 
That is, FERPA allows educational agencies 
and institutions to non-consensually release 
education records to school officials and other 
designated entities with legitimate educational 
interests 20 U.S.C. § 1232g(b(1)(A)"

To confirm or ease my fears, here is some more "legalese",

"a 
third-party contractor, consultant, 
volunteer, or other party to whom an 
agency or institution has outsourced 
institutional services for which the 
agency or institution would otherwise 
use employees—as long as that third 
party’s use and maintenance of education 
records is under the direct control of the 
agency or institution and is subject to 
the regulation requirements governing 
the use and redisclosure of PII from 
education records......
.....The disclosure is to organizations conducting 
studies for, or on behalf of, educational 
agencies or institutions for specified 
purposes related to predictive tests, student 
aid programs, or the improvement of 
instruction......
.............The disclosure is in connection with a health 
or safety emergency .............."

So yes corporations, government officials, volunteers etc can see the data. And what defines a health or safety emergency? A natural disaster, yes....but could there be a "psychological risk screening", "immunization study" or other "emergency" where data is collected? Again, the answer is unclear.

Can you view your child's records to ensure compliance?t  Yes....kind of. You probably will not know who else views their data but you can know what they view.... kind of. I have heard fro parents that is isn't just a walk in and see them scenario, that schools stall and send you from one person to another; some schools reportedly have even tried to charge a fee for the records. Regardless, here is the law.

"FERPA (20 U.S.C. § 1232g (a) and the related 
regulations (34 CFR § 99) establish the right of 
a parent to inspect and review his or her child’s 
(or in the case of an eligible student his or her 
own) education record for accuracy."


I hope these two posts, links, excerpts, and commentary have helped parents and educators at least know what is happening with data (even if some of this information is three years old, thus outdated).

Who Needs to Know?

As one may surmise, one of my biggest apprehensions regarding CCSS (Common Core Standards) is the LDS (Longitudinal Data Sysyem) collections proposed.

I found a document http://nces.ed.gov/pubs2011/2011602.pdf that had some interesting information that I will copy and paste here. Enjoy!

The Fair Information Practice of Data 
Minimization and Retention calls for “only 
collecting personally identifiable information that 
is directly relevant and necessary to accomplish 
the specified purpose(s). [And for] only retaining 
personally identifiable information for as long as 
is necessary to fulfill the specified purpose(s).”

This sounds innocent but who decides what is relevant and necessary, and for how long? With P-20 in position, the information could be viable and important for more than 20 years of a person's life. The types of data could include psychological profiles, behavioral records, health records and religious affiliation, to name a few. http://truthinamericaneducation.com/privacy-issues-state-longitudinal-data-systems/privacy-invasiondata-mining/what-400-data-points/ links to https://ceds.ed.gov/elements.aspx?v=3&ex= and http://nces.ed.gov/forum/datamodel/eiebrowser/techview.aspx?instance=studentPostsecondary  which outline these proposed records to be collected on students. Each to their own, but who wants this information collected on their children, especially when the length of time and who views the data remains vague?

Perhaps I am paranoid but thus next excerpt shows my worst fears;

"Linkage with information from an external 
source could occur as a result of a direct linkage 
by someone with access to two confidential 
data systems who is able to directly link the two 
databases (e.g., the student record linked to local 
public health records on sexually transmitted 
diseases or local crime records) or as a result of a 
less direct linkage of information from a student’s 
education record with information available in 
public records (e.g., the education record for a 
15-year-old Asian female includes participation 
in services for unmarried pregnant students, and 
public birth records could be used to identify 
the father of the student’s child. Alternatively, an 
education record might show that a 13-year-old 
female student was the victim of a violent assault 
during the school day on a specific date (without 
the specifics of the assault). Meanwhile, a report 
in a local newspaper, while protecting the direct 
identifiers of the victim, reveals some of the details 
of an assault on a female student in that school on 
the same date)."

The collection of data has purpose which to me seems to conflict, Case in point;

"INSTRUCTION—Teacher and counselors 
need information about an individual 
student’s previous educational experiences 
and any special needs the student might have 
to deliver appropriate instruction and services 
and to plan educational programs; parent 
contact information is needed to keep parents 
informed of student progress. 
» OPERATIONS—Schools and districts need 
data for individual students to ensure the 
efficiency of day-to-day functions such as 
attendance records, meeting individual 
students’ special needs, handling individual 
students’ health problems, and operating food 
service and transportation programs.
» MANAGEMENT—Schools, districts, and 
state education agencies use data about 
students for planning and scheduling 
educational programs and for the distribution 
of resources. ACCOUNTABILITY—Schools, districts, 
and state education agencies use data 
about students and about individual 
students’ progress to provide information 
about students’ accomplishments and 
the effectiveness of schools and specific 
educational programs. 
» RESEARCH AND EVALUATION—Schools, 
local, state, and federal education agencies 
use data about students and about individual 
students’ progress to conduct analysis 
of program effectiveness, the success 
of student subgroups, and changes in 
achievement over time to identify effective 
instructional strategies and to promote school 
improvement. "

I understand the purposes outlined here and agree with them, having had managed two schools' data a few years ago. But what does the information about an assault on campus that was reported in the news?  How would maternal last name, religious affiliation, and website URL be used in the classroom, or at the state and federal level to improve instruction?

 Again, I remind you of P20, that these records will follow you through life:

"To facilitate the 
usefulness of this information, the legislation 
also calls for an alignment between P–12 and 
postsecondary data systems, which requires 
linkages between student and teacher records, 
between preschool and elementary education, and 
between secondary and postsecondary education 
and the workforce."

It seems who will access student information remains unspecified, and the most private data such as biometrics and social security numbers are of course of highest concern. This document states that such records wqill only be accessed by and for a need to know basis but there lacks a definition of "need to know".

"After the risk level is established, consideration 
should be given to providing more protection 
and more restrictions on access for the data 
elements that are identified as highly sensitive. 
For example, these data elements might be stored 
apart from the rest of the student record in a 
more secure electronic environment, with access 
limited to “need to know” circumstances for only 
a subset of those with access to the system."

One possible relief is the proposal to give students unique identifier numbers (California already has such a thing) separate from their Social Security number; the article adds a second layer of security that at least did not exist in California during the 2010-2011 school year; a unique linking code to access social security numbers which few have access to, so that Social Security numbers will be more secure.

Who might be managing your child's data or accessing the linking codes? Well,

"PII carries a potential for misuse. As a result, it is
advisable to require security screenings for staff
members whose job responsibilities require them
to have access to PII in student education records.
The screening might include a background
investigation using written, electronic, telephone,
or personal contact to determine the suitability,
eligibility, and qualifications of a staff member for
employment."

This sounds great, yet humans are, well, human. Every year across the nation, teachers with supposed clean records and qualifications attend yearly training of confidentiality and test procedures, signing legally binding affidavits and yet every year there are teachers and administrators across the nation breaching confidentiality of these tests. Therefore, how can a similar procedure protect your child's data with 100% assuredness?

Stay tuned for part II of my analysis of this document.

P20, LDS, CCSS Data WILL control your child's future

P20 will mold your child into a specific career, not of your child's choosing but of the State's, Government's, or workforce/corporation's desire and need. With the collection of over 400 data points with LDS (Longitudinal Data Systems) being developed under CCSS, comes the sharing of that data with governmental agencies, colleges, and workplaces.

So what, you might say. Well thorough the scientific management of people, known as "human capital", little Billy and Susie will no longer be Billy or Susie but numbers in a system, funneled into specific tasks in society based on assessment results, behavioral data, or merely just a need for more widget makers. Just like in the social efficiency movement, our children are seen as future workers, machines of labor, no longer unique individuals with dreams and desires but robots called human capital, scientifically designed to serve the corporate machine.

From http://www.wiche.edu/info/publications/FrameworkForAMultistateHumanCapitalDevelopmentDataSystem.pdf , a well renowned document full of information worth reading, comes this:

"The workforce sector wants information about prior training in 
high school and postsecondary institutions as a foundation for 
working with both education sectors to address identified skill gaps 
in the workforce, as well as to identify equity gaps with respect 
to demographic representativeness by job category. Knowing the 
education sectors’ capacity to respond (i.e., by increasing the flow 
of graduates with particular skill sets) will also help the state decide 
whether to invest in education to address skill gaps or establish 
incentives to induce more workers with needed skills to move 
into the state. Moreover, linking with the education sectors would 
provide labor market analysts with a wealth of data that would be 
useful for examining equity in employment."

Did you read that? By increasing the flow of graduates with a particular skill set? Think....how can they do this? Let's scale this idea down quite a lot, to ten students, numbered 1-10.
1-3 want to be doctors,
4, a firefighter,
5-7, teachers,
8-10 truck drivers.
However, the workforce sector has an overabundance of teachers and truck drivers but needs more soldiers and HR managers. So, by collecting data and seeing which child might possess a personality for the military, or by, God forbid, changing a child's educartional path completely, suddenly you have...
1-2 doctors.
3 became a soldier
4, firefighter
5, teacher
6 became an HR manager
7, solider
8, truck driver
9, solider
10, HR manager

Suddenly, business, through data has manipulated the future, manipulated our children through education to shape a desired future, by increasing the flow of graduates with a specific set of skills.


Is this what we want for our children?