Amelia Vance writes:
Today, the Commission on Evidence-Based Policymaking released their final report. The Commission was created through bi-partisan legislation in 2016 to “consider how to strengthen government’s evidence-building and policymaking efforts” (page 16). One of the key issues that the Commission heard from advocates on all sides about whether to overturn the current federal ban on connecting education data collected by the federal government in order to provide students, postsecondary institutions, and the public with information that could be used to improve policies or better target federal funding. Education organizations that support overturning the current federal ban on connecting education data collected by the federal government with other data were very excited by the report: among other recommendations, the Commission advocated that Congress consider repealing current bans on the collection and use of data for evidence building. However, the concerns of privacy advocates that appeared in many public comments to the Commission were not overlooked: the word “privacy” is mentioned in the report 408 times (out of 114 pages), and numerous privacy and security protections were recommended by the Commission.
Read more on the Future of Privacy Forum.