Ann Dornfield reports:
KUOW has learned that the Washington state education department has signed agreements to share non-public student data with media organizations including The Seattle Times and the Associated Press. Data security experts say the agreements raise serious privacy concerns for the state’s public school students.
Do read more about this agreement and the concerns it raises on KUOW. It sounds like journalists want to do what could be useful investigative analyses and pieces that perhaps the state should be doing. But the journalists (AP and Seattle Times) can’t get the data because of FERPA so they’ve entered into contracts with the state. Very concerning….
Thanks to @EducationNY for this link.
Update: KUOW revised their article to focus on privacy of student data and to allay parent concerns that Social Security numbers would be shared. They will not be. Read the full article here.