Video: Chancellor Rosa on class size, student privacy, testing, charter schools, Common Core and more!

Update: articles about this event were published in the Daily News and Chalkbeat.

Here's a video of Friday night's Education Forum at George Washington HS featuring our new Regents Chancellor Betty Rosa, moderated by investigative reporter Juan Gonzalez and co-sponsored by Community Education Council D6, Class Size Matters and the CB12M Youth and Education Committee.  As someone said afterwards, Dr. Rosa is a "breath of fresh air" compared to many of those who had been running our state education system up to now.

Unfortunately, the videographer had to change the battery in the midst of my question about student privacy at about 50 minutes in.  So FYI here's the full question; check the video to see her answer.  Happy Mother's Day everyone!  Leonie

In April 2014, we had a big victory when the state legislature passed a law barring the disclosure of personal student data to a corporation called inBloom Inc., which our then Commissioner of Education John King was determined to do.   In that same law there were several other important provisions including the appointment of a chief privacy officer with a background in civil liberties and privacy law; and a Parent Bill of Privacy Rights that would explain existing federal and state law and expand upon it with the input of parents.  Both were supposed to happen with a deadline of July 2014.   

Yet it is nearly two years past the deadline, and neither one of these has happened.  Moreover, I recently found out that there is a plan to take all the personal student data for all the public school students in the state, including their names, addresses, grades, test scores, disciplinary files, and disability records and perhaps more, and put it in the state archives for potentially up to 100 years or more, with unclear restrictions on access. What can we do to make sure that the State education dept. is doing its job, complying with the law, and protecting student privacy?

Education Forum May 6 with Chancellor Betty Rosa and Juan Gonzalez from Class Size Matters on Vimeo.