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posted by on Saturday January 28 2017, @10:47AM   Printer-friendly
from the can-you-say-the-Man? dept.

This is a slightly older article that just came to my attention today, though the data systems it describes are currently being built out and used. It seems to be quite a well researched article, with a ton of links to sources.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/answer-sheet/wp/2015/11/12/the-astonishing-amount-of-data-being-collected-about-your-children/

Basically, it's talks about sensitive data entered into a new breed of student information systems, with very few legal protections around that data. These systems collect data with a common schema. The common schema would seem to allow for large-scale analysis of the data later on. You can get more information on the schema and potential data collected by the Common Education Data Standards (CEDS) here: https://ceds.ed.gov/

If you send your children to a public school, under current federal law you have no way of opting out of the P20 profile that has been created by your state and potentially shared with others. You also have no right to refuse to have your child's data disclosed to testing companies and other corporations in the name of evaluation and research.

I'm not done digging into this, but it seems important for those of that are concerned about massive amounts of data collection and in this case, what it means for our children who are literally being tracked and data-mined from birth.


Original Submission

 
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  • (Score: 0, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 28 2017, @11:02AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 28 2017, @11:02AM (#459860)

    Things are going to slide, slide in all directions /
    Won't be nothing /
    Nothing you can measure anymore /
    The blizzard, the blizzard of the world /
    has crossed the threshold

  • (Score: 5, Insightful) by BsAtHome on Saturday January 28 2017, @12:16PM

    by BsAtHome (889) on Saturday January 28 2017, @12:16PM (#459865)

    /s
    How else can corporate America profit from the unwilling crowd? You need to know your enemy (euphemism for customer) to make a good situation into a brilliant situation for a few. You cannot expect an insurance company to invest in a perpetually ill child, now, can you? How else can we marginalize and disenfranchise the masses than to ensure the collection of blackmail information (euphemism for big-data) from birth? We The People should know our place and that is at the bottom. We, corporate America, are the ones that know how to run the country. We, corporate America, are the rulers of capitalism. There is only so much space at the top. There can only be one (well, maybe a few) who decide what is good for you. And, please, here you have some crumbs to live on; everything else we need to defend against our foreign archenemy, who always tries to destroy our great way of life.
    /s

    Sounds awfully like all the good science fiction books, doesn't it?

    • (Score: 3, Insightful) by khallow on Saturday January 28 2017, @02:04PM

      by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Saturday January 28 2017, @02:04PM (#459879) Journal
      All this talk of "corporate America" when it is the state (well technically, one of many states) collecting the data. And while the article speculates about what corporations might have access to this data, it baldly states:

      Pay special attention to Section V, the Data Use section of the grant proposal, requiring states to collect and share early childhood data, match students and teachers for the purpose of teacher evaluation, and promote inter-operability across institutions, agencies, and states.

      Once again, we have this bizarre situation where an expansion of government power is accompanied by concern about the evil corporations taking advantage of the situation. Maybe it's time to worry about who is actually creating the problem?

      • (Score: 2) by http on Saturday January 28 2017, @09:05PM

        by http (1920) on Saturday January 28 2017, @09:05PM (#459934)

        Do you honestly think this expanded application of government power came about without any nudging from corporate interests?

        --
        I browse at -1 when I have mod points. It's unsettling.
        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 28 2017, @09:09PM

          by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 28 2017, @09:09PM (#459935)

          It's possible.

          But it's a wholly unnecessary hypothesis. The government (and in fact governments in general) have shown every evidence of slavering eagerness at every opportunity to track, measure and ultimately control everyone in reach, citizen or not, and will collaborate with other governments to do exactly that.

          Trying to muddy the waters when discussing a problem with governments as they exist by casting aspersions at corporations is a cheap red herring.

        • (Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday January 28 2017, @09:43PM

          by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Saturday January 28 2017, @09:43PM (#459938) Journal

          Do you honestly think this expanded application of government power came about without any nudging from corporate interests?

          A corporate nudge is quite a different thing from the corporate domination alleged by BsAtHome. And we still have that a variety of government agencies and public schools made the problem happen not some corporate wishful thinking.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 29 2017, @04:41PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 29 2017, @04:41PM (#460283)

        All this talk of "corporate America" when it is the state (well technically, one of many states) collecting the data.

        Sure, sure, it's the state collecting it, but *for whom* are they collecting it and *to whom* are they giving it? If you cross your eyes, do you see that big protruding thing in the center of your face? Try looking beyond it from time to time...

        • (Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday January 29 2017, @06:56PM

          by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Sunday January 29 2017, @06:56PM (#460341) Journal

          Sure, sure, it's the state collecting it, but *for whom* are they collecting it and *to whom* are they giving it?

          I already noted that they are collecting for the state. But an AC said this better:

          But it's a wholly unnecessary hypothesis. The government (and in fact governments in general) have shown every evidence of slavering eagerness at every opportunity to track, measure and ultimately control everyone in reach, citizen or not, and will collaborate with other governments to do exactly that.

          Trying to muddy the waters when discussing a problem with governments as they exist by casting aspersions at corporations is a cheap red herring.

  • (Score: 4, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 28 2017, @01:17PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 28 2017, @01:17PM (#459869)

    In a story submission about being tracked, it is kinda messed up that the URL to the article has a tracking tag embedded in it.

    The editors should strip off the "?utm_term=.d2be527873e8"

    Firefox users can go one further and install the Pure URL [mozilla.org] extension to automagically strip off well-known tracking tags.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 28 2017, @01:50PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 28 2017, @01:50PM (#459875)

      Another good privacy plugin. Thanks!

      Perhaps it should be extended to randomise the parm value to poison the well

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 29 2017, @04:44PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 29 2017, @04:44PM (#460285)

        I like the way you think!

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 28 2017, @02:56PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 28 2017, @02:56PM (#459891)

      Tried the Chrome version and it didn't alter the Washington Post link or redirect it.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 28 2017, @02:19PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 28 2017, @02:19PM (#459881)

    What are we gonna do when Uncle Samuel comes around
    Askin' for the young one's name
    And lookin' for the print of his hand for the files in their numbers game
    I don't want his chances for freedom to ever be that slim
    Let's not tell 'em about him -

  • (Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 28 2017, @03:31PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 28 2017, @03:31PM (#459901)

    The obvious rebuttal is that government is forcing people to do be tracked by threat of force.

    If we just require that all schools be privatized then the government won't be able to do this to our children anymore. Private corporations in high-friction markets are so much more trustworthy and amendable to consumer demands. The invisible hand will sprinkle fairy dust on it and everything will be fixed.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 29 2017, @12:37AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 29 2017, @12:37AM (#459988)

      Franken: No Dems will vote to confirm DeVos for secretary of Education [deadstate.org]
      According to The Hill, Senator Al Franken (D-Minn) says [thehill.com] President Trump's pick for Education Secretary Betsy DeVos will receive zero support from Democrats regarding her confirmation.

      Speaking to MSNBC's Rachel Maddow on [January 26], Franken said that Democrats were lobbying for Republicans to vote 'no' on her confirmation as well.

      "She is an ideologue who knows next to nothing about education policy as ... she demonstrated really in her confirmation hearing"

      Besides knowing absolutely nothing about education policy, DeVos is also a religious fanatic who wants to see Fundamentalist Christianity in public schools--and no other religion.

      The Republicans have a 52-48 majority in the Senate.
      If The Blues vote as a bloc, it will require 3 Reds to vote against her.

      With The Reds refusing to even schedule a hearing in Obama's SCOTUS nominee and e.g. Elizabeth Warren then voting to approve Ben Carson's nomination to the cabinet, this would be a welcome change to The Blues' pattern of rolling over and playing dead.

      -- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]

  • (Score: 4, Interesting) by Geezer on Saturday January 28 2017, @04:38PM

    by Geezer (511) on Saturday January 28 2017, @04:38PM (#459908)

    No worries here, at least on this front. My school records are so ancient that two of the schools don't even exist any more, and I doubt if anyone is going to foot the bill for data entry of 50 years' worth of probably-lost paper archives. Let 'em search the ruins for the Dead Geezer Scrolls.

    My son is well out of Engineering school as well. My grand-daughters are being home-schooled. The whole family is tech-literate and privacy-aware.

    I truly believe that empowerment begins with education, and that technical literacy, at some level above sophomoric social apps, and privacy awareness should be essential parts of basic education today.

    Of course it's effectively impossible to maintain complete privacy these days without being an Amish recluse, but where there's an intrusive will, there's often a devious way to thwart it.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 29 2017, @12:20AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 29 2017, @12:20AM (#459981)

      First they came for the ACs and I did not speak out because,
        > I filter out AC's. Every single one. Life is good.