Data Mining: A "Kindler, Gentler Surveillance"?

Your human capital is important to Silicon Valley

Data issues and invasion of privacy concerns crop up constantly these days.  We hear reports of Anonymous hacking into government websites, credit card information compromised and people are upset their Facebook information gets posted in places unknown to the Facebook user.  

Quartz (qz.com) asked this question:  Analysis: Is big data to Barack Obama what big oil was to George W. Bush? and informs the reader how this administration is allowing private business freedom to use personal data for corporate gain.  This data sharing of personal information, however, is eroding individual privacy and has privacy experts concerned about the manner in which this bill of rights was developed and lack of legal protection for individuals:

When the White House unveiled its new privacy bill of rights, almost exactly one year ago, the event was heralded by one consumer advocate as “the clearest articulation of the right to privacy by a US president in history.” But attention quickly shifted to the the bill’s limitations. Users could opt out of targeted ads, but this alone wouldn’t end ad tracking. The bill relied too heavily on voluntary commitments by advertisers like Google and Facebook. And though the bill was strong on “rights,” it lacked details on implementation and enforcement. Critics also pointed out that the American Commerce Department, which represents American businesses—not consumers—had spearheaded the bill and was in charge of developing the policies meant to enforce it.

Reread that last sentence and compare it to the education reform spearheaded by special interests,  Common Core Standards in particular.  Consumers (taxpayers) did not spearhead this initiative.  It was formulated by private trade organizations (the National Governors Association and the Chief Council of State School Officers) and the public was largely unaware of this takeover of state/local control of education.  Like the American Commerce Department, the NGA and CCSSO are in charge (with funding from the Federal Government) of developing the policies meant to enforce it.  And like the privacy bill of rights for consumers designed by this administration, FERPA lacks details on implementation and enforcement and expands the transmission of personal data to third parties.

The article states the EU is concerned about this data sharing:

Now, one year later, as Europe reviews its own wide-ranging privacy legislation for implementation, Silicon Valley is sending hordes of lobbyists across the Atlantic. And the Commerce Department is at it again, leading the charge in Brussels.

Two requirements in the proposed EU laws stick like thorns in the side of the American data collection industry: one, that tech firms receive prior approval (i.e., informed consent) from users before collecting their personal data, and two, that the refusal of data tracking be an accessible and irreversible option. Silicon Valley, which has built a thriving global business around targeted ads and data brokering, is understandably antsy.

Take those two EU requirements for data collection and expand it to the data collection envisioned for children tracked from "cradle to career": 

• One, that educational institutions receive prior approval (i.e., informed consent) from parents before collecting children's personal data
• Two, that the refusal of data tracking be an accessible and irreversible option.

These options have not been given to parents regarding the massive upcoming data collection on their children and most parents are probably not even aware what data is being gathered and where this data is being sent and for what purposes.

Big business does not like these privacy safeguards in the educational or non-educational realm:

To the growing indignation of European officials (paywall), lawmakers in Brussels are lobbied by five or six different American law firms every single day. And the American government is adding fuel to fire. A recent statement from the US Mission to the EU urges Europe to be “more flexible” about issues such as consent from internet users. “Interoperability of our respective privacy regimes is critical to maintaining our extraordinary economic relationship,” it said. For its part, the American Chamber of Commerce has been organizing events in Brussels and Strasbourg, leading one European official to tell the New York Times that, “My impression is that the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the Commerce Department are mostly just following the interests of Silicon Valley.”  (MEW note: See letter of 72 businesses signing on to the support of CCSS here).

Why are business interests superseding the rights of the individual?

This lobbying highlights a relationship between technology companies and the American government that echoes the close ties between the energy sector and the previous administration of George W. Bush. Silicon Valley was an important source of campaign finance for the Obama presidential campaign: Employees of tech firms donated seven times as much to the Democratic candidate as to his opponent, Mitt Romney. (Big Oil, by contrast, gave eight times as much to Romney as to Obama.) Obama’s election victories in 2008 and 2012 hinged at least to some degree on his campaign’s groundbreaking use of technology and social media. And the president’s second-term agenda, such as his proposal to ease immigration requirements for high-skilled workers, has drawn applause from technology executives.

Data mining your human capital to educational reform companies is no different than accessing your Facebook information, your credit card scores and your shopping habits.  The educational reforms require massive Silicon Valley technologies and the CCSS are important to drive this implementation.  Think how handy it will be for companies to hire employees based on their data sets and the issues of human personalities won't have to figure into the equation.  The data is measurable and scientific.  The hunt for data is too much to resist (and creates more jobs ) and the vision of data solving the world's problems is guiding many of these companies:

....Tien, the EFF lawyer, also suggests that the American government isn’t putting pressure on Europe solely for the sake of American business. “You have to think about the phenomenon of Big Data, how enthralling that vision is,” he says. “The way people in Silicon Valley talk about harnessing Big Data isn’t just about economic incentives, it’s about solving problems, curing cancer, solving the world’s ills. It’s ultimately quite different from railing against the Patriot Act. It’s a kinder, gentler surveillance.”  But still, Tien said, the American government, and Silicon Valley lobbyists, “should own up to the real privacy issues Big Data raises.”

Why do your children require a "kinder, gentler surveillance" from "cradle to career"? Do you really believe the American government and lobbyists are concerned about privacy issues?  With all the furor over the privacy issues raised post Patriot Act, where is the outrage of the data gathering/sharing of children's personal data to government agencies and private firms?
     

   

The FTC is Worried About Child Privacy. The Department of Education, Not so Much.

Government urges more info on kids' apps

From eSchool News: 

“There is almost no information on what data is being collected and how it is being shared,” said David Jacobs of the Electronic Privacy Information Center.


The government DOES want to protect its citizens from privacy breaches!  It is protecting our right to privacy!  Yes!  Just like Facebook, the government is concerned about your children being tracked by private companies and wants to put a stop to the practice.  

What's missing from the last sentence?  Did you think the above quote was for all data gathered in the private AND public arena?  The FTC doesn't want Google to track your children via personal data gathered, but it's okay for the Department of Education to have access to even more invasive personal data to share with the Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services and private research companies to supply the workforce. 

Where's the disconnect here?  Is anyone else concerned why our information should belong to the government? Why is it permissible for ANY entity, private or governmental, to have access to personal data not voluntarily provided? Why is the FTC worried about kids' apps and privacy data, but the DOEd is willing and mandating private information be shared?

(More reading on the FTC's move to protect privacy may be found here.)

Polar Monitors Used to Track Student Depression, Suicide, Cancer, Alcohol/Drug Use, Sexual Activity? Public Student Data Stored on polargofit.com website

Polar Monitors may not only measure and provided data to schools about physical activity and heart rates in PE classes, there may also be assessments relating to student suicide, depression, cancer and diabetes risk.  It can even track student sexual activity, drug and alcohol use.  The company states this these invasive assessments are only suggested for those students 18 years or older, but is this the type of information that should be gathered by educational institutions on students of any age?  

The circumvention of FERPA law will allow this information to be disseminated on your student to various federal agencies and private companies.  The article contains a nifty link so you can see how this information will be gathered and how with the click of a mouse, broadcast to the cloud(s).


You can also read how school districts are funding these expensive monitors while cutting teachers and support staff.  We'll be writing more about this in the future and provide links so you can determine if your school district is signing onto this program providing your student's data and personal information to entities, probably without your knowledge or active permission.

This is from "Is the Privacy of the American Student at Risk" at The Revered Review:

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School:  A place where children learn to read and write. A place where they learn mathematics, science and history. Moreover, a place, away from home, where children are supposed to be safe.

Yet now it’s a place, across the country, where children’s hearts are being monitored, their activities are being tracked, and it’s being determined if students are obese or overweight. In addition, health risk assessments are being made on students and the information can be stored or saved as a PDF file.

In this physical education class, students are training using spin bicycles. However, in many schools, students are using Polar monitors in physical education classes. (Photo Credit: MJMonty)

Some students across the country, including in many small towns—are now wearing heart rate monitors and activity monitors—sometimes, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week—as part of their schools’ phys ed programs. The New York Post reported that three schools were using these monitors and some, including the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and parents, questioned the possible intrusion into students’ privacy.

(Link here to continue reading the rest of the article from Revered Review)

Are Parkway Parents Paying Attention??!

It looks like Parkway parents didn't catch this at the last couple of school board meetings when it was being budgeted for and approved, but hopefully they caught it today in St Louis Today's Suburban Journal.  The Parkway school district will outfit all their elementary students with a "health meter" that they will be required to wear 24/7 for a week (for now). Read the full article below.

Parkway's use of fitness monitors raises privacy questions

When is the line crossed between better health and surveillance?

In early 2012, wristwatch-like devices called Polar active monitors will be used by older students in PE classes at all 18 Parkway elementary schools. District officials say the devices should help improve the students' fitness and academic achievement. 

Later this school year, the district plans to collect data about activity levels and even sleep patterns for a week at a time. It will have the students wear the devices round the clock.

Some parents and legal experts are raising privacy concerns about at least that aspect of the program.

The project
Ron Ramspott, coordinator of health, outdoor and physical education for Parkway, said a pilot project started in Aprilprovided the monitors during physical education classes to students at Henry and Ross elementary schools. Shenandoah Valley Elementary School in Chesterfield joined the pilot in August.

At the district's Dec. 7 Board of Education meeting, the board approved expanding the project beyond the pilot phase. For the program starting this year at all elementary schools, the district will target grades four and five initially, Ramspott said.The monitors measure activity by tracking every movement of the person wearing them. They display steps taken, calories spent and time spent at various levels of activity. An animated figure on the monitor indicates the activity level. A bar shows the target time for doing moderate to vigorous activity and the amount of time achieved at that level.

Under the pilot program, the three schools each received 25 monitors, which cost $90 apiece. The monitors have been rotated among third-, fourth- and fifth-graders in physical education classes.

Each of the district's elementary schools will receive 25 monitors in January and begin using them in PE class. However, the focus of the monitors' use will change gradually, so that by the end of the year students will continually wear the monitors for a full week at a time to assess activity levels.

"We want to be able to look at both physical activity and sleep patterns," Ramspott said. "We also want to see how various activity levels correlate to student achievement and behavior."

Concerns of parents
Ramspott said Parkway will require parental consent to participate largely because of the responsibility of caring for the monitors. (Really!!? They only want parental consent to care for the monitors - MEW question.)

--> "We haven't had any parents refuse to participate at this point as we have only used them in PE classes," Ramspott said. But some parents and others insist they have concerns.

Beth Huebner, PTO co-president at Ross and mother of sons in first and fourth grades, said she wasn't aware of her older child wearing one of the devices and she was never asked for consent

"I'd want to see data generated to help me understand calories burned and sleep patterns," said Huebner, a professor at the University of Missouri-St. Louis. "I would ask the district tell me about it particularly if the information would be used for district analysis."

Cara Bauer, PTO president at Shenandoah Valley and mother of a son in first grade and a daughter in fifth grade, said she's heard about the monitors from her daughter, Caroline. She said her daughter doesn't like wearing one and calls them "the funny watch."

"I wish Parkway would let parents know what's going on with the program," Bauer said. "I feel they're getting into privacy issues, into people's personal lives, when they have to be worn at home. That kind of makes me a little leery, and, though I think the monitors are a fantastic idea in school, I don't want that at
home." She questioned how the data will be used.

"What will they do with all this information they'll glean from my kid?" Bauer asked. "I'd be curious to see what information they're getting off these contraptions. They're OK in PE, but they make me question why the district isn't being up front with parents about what the program will be at home."

Neil Richards, a professor of law with Washington University in St. Louis who teaches privacy and civil liberties courses, said he  feels the plan for the devices constitutes "a major privacy issue."

"The school district eventually will be engaging in surveillance of kids' sleep and exercise patterns outside the school day," he said. "Though physical activity is important and obesity is a problem, the district could not require kids to wear them because I think it would be a violation of their and their families' Fourth
Amendment rights, which is pretty easily unconstitutional."

And wearing them voluntarily doesn't eliminate privacy concerns, Richards said.

"They'll create a record of medical information about children around the clock," he said. "Even if it serves laudable public health goals, it's a fairly Orwellian step for a school district to engage in."

Benefits of monitoring

--> Ramspott said the current focus in physical education in schools has been on the benefits of especially moderate to vigorous activity. Moderate-to-vigorous physical activity is tied to the intensity of movement, he said. Examples include brisk walking, light jogging, biking, skating and dancing.

 It's recommended by the U.S. Surgeon General that people get 60 minutes of moderate to vigorous physical activity on most days of the week for obesity prevention, muscle and bone growth, stress
management and cardiovascular fitness, Ramspott said.

 "The monitors, by showing their progress, allow students to be accountable for reaching moderate to vigorous physical activity," Ramspott said

He said past research shows kids in physical education class are getting the best health benefits only 6 percent to 10 percent of the time. He said the monitors help teachers more accurately assess that percentage of time.

"So teachers can use the data to figure how to design class time to maximize physical activity," Ramspott said.

He called the devices "a much more fair way of evaluating students with regards to level of participation and physical activity in PE class, which is something that is evaluated on most if not all days in PE."
Ramspott said the district plans to share all physical activity and sleep reports with parents and begin exploring correlations between physical activity, sleep patterns, health risk factors and academic performance.

"Our goal is to reduce risk factors for obesity and encourage higher student achievement," Ramspott said.
Data from both the California Study of 2003, 2005, 2007 and from Parkway show a correlation between increased levels of fitness and higher academic achievement, he said.

"Students who pass more of the fitness proficiency levels on the Parkway Fitness Test score higher on reading and math on both the MAP and SAT-7 tests," he said. "It is a positive linear correlation between fitness levels and math/reading scores on these two tests. It does not prove that fitness makes us smarter, but (it) does bring a strong case for increased fitness and the increased capacity to learn.

Laura Beckmann, physical education and health teacher at Shenandoah Valley Elementary School, said her students can watch the monitors and see their physically active minutes climb up. The school also started a web-based program so she can download each monitors's data and come up with group and individual activity summaries, to track up to three weeks of time.

"These reports will go into portfolios to let kids examine their own behaviors and set goals," Beckmann said.

Amy Sydnor, physical education and health teacher at Ross Elementary School in Creve Coeur, said her students that do not wear the monitors wear pedometers instead. Ramspott said the district uses several methods including pedometers for measuring activity levels in PE class.

Sydnor called the activity monitors "a great resource to ensure kids are getting the amount of activity they need to be healthy.

In the Rockwood School District, staff is completing setting up Polar active monitors to track the activity of fifth-grade students at Blevins Elementary School in Eureka through polargofit.com, said Ed Mathison, health and physical education content facilitator for the district.

Privacy and research

Still, parents should be asking what data is being collected from those devices and when, Richards said. They should ask what rights they have to control the data, whether data is anonymous, what safeguards will be in place to protect data, whether the district is going to give it or sell it to anyone, when data will be destroyed, and whether the district has a privacy policy available to parents.

"If a university would do this study, they'd need to have lots of approval and consent from our internal review board, because this is a form of human subject research," Richards said. "Though the district should be applauded for ensuring kids are healthy, this kind of biological surveillance seems to go far beyond what they should be concerned with."

He wonders what's next.

"Will they start monitoring kids' nutrition at home or how many hours they spend reading at home?" Richards asked.

[end Suburban Journal piece]

Questions parents should be asking:

• Is it the job of the school to track student health data?
• Once it's uploaded onto a web-based program, can the district really promise its confidentiality?
• Why does the school want information on activity at home? Is that any of their business?
• What "corrective" actions will children whose activity falls below some set point be required to take? How will that be enforced?

We will have more on this story tomorrow. In the mean time parents should begin thinking about the ramifications of collecting this kind of data.

The Sunday Education Weekly Reader: 9.18.11

Education articles are coming fast and furious these days. They concern Common Core standards, Race to the Top unfunded mandates (just discovered by state legislatures, school districts and governors as unaffordable), curriculum being taught in districts taxpayers find distasteful, etc.

We can't comment on all the articles we'd like to share, so every Sunday we will link a few stories on education we hope you will find informative with a brief description. For you readers old enough to remember, we've fashioned it after "The Weekly Reader". In a time before computers and instant information, my classmates and I enjoyed finding out about the world around us and stories that transported us beyond our classroom.

We hope these educational articles we post daily and in the "Education Weekly Reader" will spur you on to research educational issues for yourself. If you find stories you believe would be of interest to readers interested in education, drop us a line.

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Are you concerned about privacy rights for your family and student data? You should be. Here's a guide from Privacy Rights Clearinghouse for parents and college age students :


https://www.privacyrights.org/Education

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Here is a related story about two brothers convicted for using hacked information from University of Missouri students for financial gain:

http://www.columbiatribune.com/news/2011/sep/15/former-mu-student-brother-sentenced-scamming-schem/

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And again, a reader gets it right in the comment section on schools receiving a $10,000 grant for environmental curriculum and practices:


http://cjonline.com/news/2011-09-15/grant-funds-earth-friendly-youth-program

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Character Training for Global Citizenship


When fifteen-year-old Kevin walked into his American History class at Cupertino High School in California, he was given a handout. He glanced at the title: "Heterosexuality: Can It be Cured?" Weird, he thought and looked around. Some of his friends were studying it, too. He read on:

http://www.crossroad.to/text/articles/ctfgc97.html

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Here's an educational quote for the week (please pass on any you would like to share):

Adults who still derive childlike pleasure from hanging gifts of a ready-made education on the Christmas tree of a child waiting outside the door to life do not realize how unreceptive they are making the children to everything that constitutes the true surprise of life.
Karl Kraus

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Arne Duncan is From the Government and He is Here to Help You

In its effort to clarify student data privacy rules for researchers and education officials alike, the U.S. Department of Education proposed several changes to the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, or FERPA, on Thursday and named its first chief privacy officer.

"Data should only be shared with the right people for the right reasons," U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan said in a statement on the proposals. "We need common-sense rules that strengthen privacy protections and allow for meaningful uses of data. The initiatives announced today will help us do just that."

There is a pesky problem standing in the way of sharing student data between states and Federal Agencies: present FERPA standards. If these standards are not altered, the data necessary to supply the workforce cannot be shared.

The DOE promises your student's data will be secure. Really? What's happened the last several weeks or years regarding cyber information?

• TJX, the parent company of T.J. Maxx, Marshalls, and other retailers, has not acknowledged how data on more than 45 million credit and debit card users who had shopped at the company's retail locations was stolen and sold to fraudsters. (May 9, 2007)
  

• A data breach involving online marketer Epsilon, whose clients are a Who’s Who of major banks and retailers, was only the latest in a string of hacking attacks aimed at getting email records for more thefts. Companies that have said they were exposed since then include banks Citigroup Inc and Capital One Financial Corp, and retailers Walgreen Co and Best Buy Co. (April 5, 2011)

• According to U.S. investigators, China has stolen terabytes of sensitive data -- from usernames and passwords for State Department computers to designs for multi-billion dollar weapons systems. And Chinese hackers show no signs of letting up. "The attacks coming out of China are not only continuing, they are accelerating," says Alan Paller, director of research at information-security training group SANS Institute in Washington, DC.

  Secret U.S. State Department cables, obtained by WikiLeaks and made available to Reuters by a third party, trace systems breaches -- colorfully code-named "Byzantine Hades" by U.S. investigators -- to the Chinese military. An April 2009 cable even pinpoints the attacks to a specific unit of China's People's Liberation Army. (April 14, 2010).

The data sets from the National Data Education Model are set and ready to be used on your student. Don't worry if there is a cyber security attack on the Longitudinal Data Systems; information to be gleaned from an attack would only include some of the following:

• Base salary or wage
• Blood type
• Height and Weight
• Dwelling Arrangement
• Health Care History
• Health Care Plan
• Identification Results
• Immunization Status
• Insurance Coverage
• Overall Health Status
• Residence Block Number
• Social Security Number
  
• Voting Status

The United States Government cannot stop cyber attacks from China; why should taxpayers believe student privacy is secure because of a change in FERPA legislation?

If you believe this information is secure, you will also believe the following:

According to the No Child Left Behind Act, by 2014 every child is supposed to test on grade level in reading and math.

Not every child can test on grade level in reading and math. It's an admirable goal, but impossible to achieve. That's not going to happen. The goal for data systems is to beef up privacy protections. Like the NCLB goal, it sounds great, but if the government cannot stop foreign countries from hacking into military computers, do you believe the DOE can safeguard student data from hackers?

Read this sentence in the second paragraph again: We need common-sense rules that strengthen privacy protections and allow for meaningful uses of data. The problem with that sentence? Strengthening privacy protections don't safeguard the privacy and the "meaningful uses of data" should raise questions for anyone concerned about the constitutional right to individual privacy that your government is determined to document and share.

Your Child's Test Answers...Invasion of Your Privacy?

Do you know the extent and usage of information being gathered on your family and your child when your child answers certain tests? It's not just information learned from a textbook, it's also about your student's and your family life. From the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP):

Specifically, under the No Child Left Behind Act, NAEP is required to collect information on and report achievement results disaggregated by the following variables, when possible: gender, race and ethnicity, socioeconomic status (SES), disability status, and English language learner (ELL) status.

Sound benevolent? Maybe, maybe not. Read on:

One new approach NCES is currently investigating is the creation of a new and improved measure of socioeconomic status (SES). NCES commissioned a literature review of how SES has been defined and operationalized in other education studies and other fields such as health and marketing. This led to the idea of adopting a two-pronged approach to measuring SES. This approach involves (1) creating an enhanced student background questionnaire with items that probe resources in the home, parents’ education level, and parents’ employment status, among other variables; and (2) using geocoding software to link students’ home addresses to aggregate SES data available from the United States Bureau of the Census. Development of the new SES measure commenced in 2005, with the goal of piloting it in 2009 and possibly implementing it in 2011.

We know the Longitudinal Data System is to be linked to the Departments of Labor and Health and Human Services. The NAEP is already connected to the Census Bureau, so we'll see if the Census Bureau will be a repository for LDS data as well. Does that make you uneasy your child's address is geocoded to gather more information? Is anyone concerned about privacy issues?

We'll be highlighting what is in the data sets in different longitudinal data systems and tests the next few days. We know the government is asking personal questions in the NAEP. Here are two questions an 8th grader was asked on the test this week in Missouri:

VB330870
11. How far in school did your mother go?
She did not finish high school.
She graduated from high school.
She had some education after high
school.
She graduated from college.
I don’t know.
VB330871
12. How far in school did your father go?
He did not finish high school.
He graduated from high school.
He had some education after high
school.
He graduated from college.
I don’t know.