The Maine Dept. of Education will postpone collecting student Social Security numbers until the start of the 2010-11 academic year.
LD 1356, an “Act to Improve the Ability of the Department of Education to Conduct Longitudinal Data Studies,” went into effect Sept. 12, after the 2009-10 school year began. The law allows the department to collect Social Security numbers as part of efforts to track student achievement beyond the classroom and into the workforce.
By obtaining Social Security numbers, then matching the numbers with the Maine Dept. of Labor, educators hope to learn how many students go on to work in Maine and in what sectors, among other trends. Although the department has been able to track student progress while students are enrolled, the new law will facilitate tracking achievement long after graduation.
Not everyone wants to be tracked, however.
Shenna Bellows, executive director of the Maine Civil Liberties Union, said the nonprofit advocacy group lobbied to ensure disclosing Social Security numbers did not become a requirement of enrollment.
“We are very concerned about the privacy implications of the Dept. of Education collecting Social Security numbers,” Bellows said. “Social Security numbers are the key to identity theft and parents don’t have to provide this private, sensitive information.”
The original bill, sponsored by Sen. Peter Mills (R-Skowhegan) was augmented to ensure optional participation in the tracking program. Specifically, “The parental notification must include an explanation of the parent’s right that the child’s social security number is not required as a condition of enrollment and that the child’s social security number may not be used for longitudinal data purposes unless the parent provides prior written consent.”
Bellows believes the DOE is expanding its net of student information and cited its collection and tracking of disciplinary actions as example of too much information in the hands of the department.
For instance, a detention was never meant to stay with a student’s permanent record, she said.
“School detentions or suspensions were never intended to be forms of permanent punishment or a scarlet letter,” Bellows said. “But this centralized data system creates a permanence that did not necessarily exist before.”
MCLU is concerned student disciplinary actions can create a permanent record with the state. “There is danger of exposure or consequences,” she said.
The disciplinary information is recorded as aggregate numbers, according to Bill Hurwitch, director of the DOE’s longitudinal data system.
In addition, all student Social Security numbers used by the department will also be converted into new identification numbers, limiting the chance of misuse, according to Hurwitch. Only the DOE could match the new identification number to the originating Social Security number.
Tracking student progress at the state level is nothing new and not unique to Maine, he said. Maine has been tracking students, kindergarten through grade 12, with help from a $3.25 million grant from the National Center for Education Statistics. Maine is one of 41 states to receive funding for enhanced data systems.
The federal funds helped DOE form the Maine Statewide Longitudinal Data System and Hurwitch now hopes the state will receive a second round of funding to continue tracking beyond the classroom.
Passage of LD 1356 helps the state show a willingness to track the efficacy of educational programs, he said, yet continuation of the data collection beyond public schools and into the workforce is contingent upon renewed funding.
“We are trying to get people to understand we don’t give out personably identifiable information,” Hurwitch said. “We are doing it for program evaluation and the goal is to improve student achievement.”
Still, that does little to allay Bellows’ concerns.
“We are very, very concerned that the Dept. of Education is incorporating too much data into its system,” she said.
All student information collected by the Dept. of Education is subject to a 1974 law that precludes individually identifiable information from being released to non-governmental agencies, Hurwitch said. The Family Educational Rights Privacy Act prohibits the public release of individual information.
Bellows is less concerned with state agencies sharing data than with the potential for the accidental or malicious release of electronic information, especially Social Security numbers.
“We want parents to know that the program is always an opt-in program,” Bellows said. “Parents never have to submit children’s Social Security numbers, if they do not wish. They have a choice of whether or not they want the state tracking their child from school into the labor market.”
School administrators will ask for the Social Security numbers at the start of the 2010-11 school year, according to David Connerty-Marin, spokesman for the DOE.