Do you want Rupert Murdoch to have your child's personal & educational data? [View all]

Aug. 25, 2011, NY State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli informed the NY State Education Department that he was rejecting its proposed no-bid contract with (Murdoch-Klein's) Wireless Generation to build a state (educational) data system, composed of confidential student and teacher information because of privacy concerns.

Wireless Generation is a subsidiary of (Murdoch's) News Corporation. Several high-ranking former executives and employees of the News Corporation in the UK were being investigated for violations of privacy and bribing public officials. As the State Comptroller wrote, "in light of the significant ongoing investigations and continuing revelations with respect to News Corporation, we are returning the contract with Wireless Generation unapproved." Since then, the scandal has continued to grow, with the number of indicted News Corporation officials expanding in number.

Yet four months later, in December, the NY Board of Regents approved NYSED’s plan to provide this confidential student and teacher data to a limited corporation, called the Shared Learning Collaborative LLC (SLC). The Gates Foundation awarded $76.5 million to form this LLC, with $44 million going to Wireless Generation, to design and operate the system...

New York is one of five states – along with Colorado, Illinois, Massachusetts, and North Carolina – participating in Phase I of this project, starting in late 2012. The pilot districts are Jefferson County School District (CO); Unit 5 (Normal, IL); District 87 (Bloomington, IL); Everett (MA); Guilford County Schools (NC), and NYC. Four more states – Delaware, Georgia, Kentucky and Louisiana – have committed to join Phase II in 2013. Though New York City is one of the pilot districts, the city’s parents have been told nothing about this project, and the state has not shared its agreement with the SLC about the use and protection of this data, despite several requests to do so.

Apart from the lack of parental disclosure and privacy concerns, the SLC website makes it clear that this student data will be used to help companies develop and market educational products. However FERPA, or the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, appears not to allow the sharing of confidential student information for commercial purposes...