Chief Privacy Officer Finally Appointed; Parents and Advocates Await Next Steps to Protect Student Data

See the Politico article this morning about NYSED's appointment (finally) of a CPO -- more than two years past the legal deadline and our press release below. UPDATE: See also articles in Schoolbook, Chalkbeat and Staten Island Advance.

For immediate release

August 24, 2016

For more information: Leonie Haimson, leonie@classsizematters.org, 917-435-9329

Chief Privacy Officer Finally Appointed; Parents and Advocates Await Next Steps to Protect Student Data

The long overdue appointment announced today by the NY State Education Department of a Chief Privacy Officer, Temitope Akinyemi, is an important step forward to begin to enforce the New York student privacy law that was originally passed on March 31, 2014 as part of the state budget, along with the banning of the plan to share personal student data with inBloom Inc. 

Parents are relieved that more than two years following the July 29, 2014 deadline set by this law, the NY State Education Department has finally appointed a permanent Chief Privacy Officer.  Yet by that date, the CPO was also supposed to have developed an expanded Parent Bill of Privacy Rights, with the input of parents and other stakeholders.  Instead, NYSED hurriedly posted a Bill of Rights two years ago that is incomplete as to existing federal and state privacy laws – as pointed out by a letter to then-Commissioner John King in August 2014.

Said Leonie Haimson, Executive Director of Class Size Matters and co-chair of the national organization, the Parent Coalition for Student Privacy: “Now that the CPO is appointed, Ms. Akinyemi should immediately begin to reach out to parents through public hearings to improve and expand upon the Parent Bill of Rights, to gain their input so that their children’s privacy and safety can be secured. Parents have already waited too long for this to occur.”

Parents and advocates also urge Ms. Akinyemi to appoint a Data Stakeholder Advisory Panel to oversee the state’s collection and disclosure of personal student data.  According to a federal grant provided to NYSED in 2009, this Panel was supposed to “provide active and ongoing review by local constituents,” but still does not yet exist – seven years later.

Added Ms. Haimson, “Only with robust citizen oversight can we be assured that children’s personal information will be safeguarded with appropriate restrictions and protections. We recently learned that the NYSED has decided to reverse their earlier decision to put the personal data of all public school students in the State Archives, potentially forever; but this decision should never have been made in the first place.  It reflects a deficient understanding of federal law and insufficient concern with the right to privacy that all children should enjoy.”

Allison White, parent and co-founder, Port Washington Advocates for Public Education, said: “I hope the CPO will put parental concerns about student privacy and security ahead of all else. It's time the profits of tech companies and the greed of those seeking to privatize public education took a back seat to the concerns of parents seeking to protect children.”  Ms. White’s request for her child’s data last year was improperly denied initially with a demand for payment by Tina Sciocchetti, the state’s previous temporary CPO.

“There needs to be stronger oversight and enforcement of the law,” said Fatima Geidi, NYC parent, whose child’s disciplinary file was illegally posted online by Eva Moskowitz, the CEO of his former charter school, in violation of the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA). “We need someone at the state level who is looking out for the interests of New York families, rather than ignoring our concerns.” 

"The appointment of a Chief Privacy Officer may bring some sense of student data protection, but until parents have the right to consent or opt out of the use of their child's individual personal data beyond the school level, data will continue to be at risk," said Lisa Rudley, Westchester County public school parent and founding member of NY State Allies for Public Education.

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NY Chief Privacy Officer makes illegal threat to charge parent to access her child's data

This letter,  sent today to Tina Sciochetti, NYS Chief Interim Privacy Officer, is reprinted with Allison White's permission.  Allison's testimony to the Cuomo Common Core Task Force on the need to protect student privacy is posted here.  Our column on the voluminous personal student data being collected in state longitudinal databases was recently published by the Washington Post here. 

It is a shame that NYSED still does not have a permanent Chief Privacy Officer or a Parent Bill of Rights developed with parent input, more than 16 months past the legal deadline. Clearly the temporary CPO in this position, with no expertise in either privacy law or civil liberties, is unqualified and incapable of of performing her critical responsibilities under the law.

Tina Sciocchetti, Chief Interim Privacy Officer

New York State Education Department

Date: November 19, 2015

via email:  CPO@nysed.gov

Dear Ms. Sciocchetti:

As you know, on June 26, 2015, I made a formal FERPA request to inspect and review (“view”) my child’s personally identifiable information (PII) data contained in the New York State Longitudinal Database. It is every parent’s right under the federal law known as FERPA, as well as the New York State Personal Privacy Protection Law, passed in 1984, to be able to inspect and review this data, and to challenge and amend it if it is erroneous. Nearly one month later, on July 20, 2015, you responded by asking me to complete a notarized verification form, which I did, and which I immediately sent back to your office .

Finally, on September 25, 2015, after much emailing back and forth and a full two months after my initial request, I received a letter from you stating that if I wanted to view my child’s PII data, I would be charged an unspecified amount. You wrote:

“Collecting all of the separate data related to a single student from the Department’s various files is a lengthy process and, under state law, the requestor bears the cost of reproducing the records (see Public Officers Law §§ 87[1][c] and 95[1][c]). If you would like an estimate of the cost of this search, please let me know.”

Please note that I am requesting the opportunity to inspect and review only my own child’s records.  FERPA puts the burden squarely on the State, as the repository of my child’s data, to make my child’s data accessible to me in a format that is readable and reviewable, free of charge.

Dale King, Director of the U.S. Department of Education’s Family Policy Compliance Office, made this clear when he recently ruled that a state is not permitted to charge parents any fee for accessing and reviewing their children’s data in its state longitudinal database.  Director King wrote:

“….educational agencies and institutions, as well as SEAs [State educational agencies] may not charge a fee for search and retrieval of education records. See § 99.ll(b)” [1] 

Please let me know when my request -- originally made nearly six months ago -- will be fulfilled.  If you are unwilling to abide by the ruling of the Family Policy Compliance Office by affording me meaningful access to my child’s PII data without fee, I will have no choice but to file a FERPA complaint with the U.S. Department of Education.

Sincerely,

Allison White  

[1] Letter from Dale King, US Dept of Education to Dale A.R. Erquiaga, Nevada Superintendent of Public Instruction, July 28, 2014 at: http://familypolicy.ed.gov/sites/fpco.ed.gov/files/Letter%20to%20Erquiaga%20072814.pdf  See also: Dad told seeing state’s records  on his kids will cost him $10 grand+,  Nevada Journal, April 24, 2014 at: http://nevadajournal.com/2014/04/24/dad-told-seeing-states-records-his-kids-will-cost-him-10-grand/  and: Federal education officials: Nevada can’t charge dad to look at children’s records; Dozens of mistakes identified in now-viewable records, , Nevada Journal, Dec.30, 2014 at: http://nevadajournal.com/2014/12/30/federal-education-officials-nevada-cant-charge-dad-look-childrens-records/

CC: MaryBeth Elia, New York State Commissioner of Education

New York Board of Regents

Assemblywoman Catherine Nolan, Chair, New York State Assembly Education Committee

Senator Carl Marcellino, Chair, New York State Senate Education Committee

Senator George Latimer, New York State Senate

Assemblyman Edward Ra, New York State Assembly

Assemblywoman Michelle Schimel, New York State Assembly

Senator Jack Martins, New York State Senate

Robert J. Freeman, Executive Director, New York State Committee on Open Government

Leonie Haimson, Executive Director, Class Size Matters; co-chair Parent Coalition for Student Privacy

inBloom executives finally testify before the NYS Assembly; what a sad spectacle it was

See the videotaped testimony of NYSED's Ken Wagner, along with a crew from inBloom Inc., including Peggy Brookins, Board Member, Jat Pannu, Senior VP of Services and Virginia Bartlett, Chief Privacy Officer before the NY Assembly Education Committee last Friday, February 28.

Highlights (or low lights): Ken Wagner giving a one sentence testimony at the beginning.  

And inBloom's VP refusing to disclose what other states they are working with, by saying they "respect the confidentiality of their clients"!!!  Too bad they don't respect the confidentiality of NYC public school children or their families. 

Thanks to the Assemblymembers present, especially Chair Cathy Nolan, Danny O'Donnell, Tom Abinante, Ed Graf and Shelley Mayer, who asked great questions but got very little information in return. The inBloom people said the system had the flexibility to allow parental opt outs of the database, contrary to what State Ed officials have maintained.

Here is the testimony of Allison White, co-author of the privacy petition, along with Deborah Abramson Brooks. There was no time allotted for parents to speak, but this is how it ends:

I will not allow my children to go to a public school if this is approved. I will protect my children's privacy and private information like medical records which are protected by our government already. I expect our government to be forthcoming about their intentions and inform us (the public) of matters that impact our children and ourselves. I will not allow the government to take away my parental decision making choice.  STOP THIS EDUCATIONAL FARCE....

Our children are not employees, they are not commodities, and they are not owned by the government or special interest groups! This unnecessary intrusion into their lives needs to stop.

Parents and children should not lose their rights to privacy. These rights MUST be Protected. I'm completely opposed to any sharing or storage of student data for the OBVIOUS and valid reasons listed in this petition.