Kids Shouldn’t Have to Sacrifice Privacy for Education - By Dipayan Ghosh and Jim Steyer, The New York Times

This year, the media has exposed — and the government, including through guidance issued by the F.B.I. has begun to address — a string of harms to individual privacy by the technology sector’s leading firms. But policymakers must intervene specifically to protect the most precious and vulnerable people in our society: children. Their behavioral data is continuously suctioned up by technology firms through tablets, smartphones and computers and is at risk of being misused.

For many American children, going to school means handing over personal data. The Summit “personalized learning” educational tool — a platform for online lessons and assessments that was developed by a charter school network with the help of Facebook engineers and is backed by the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative — has been criticized for asking parents to consent to sharing their children’s personal data, including their names, internet activity and grades. Google has vastly expanded its reach into America’s schools as more than half of students use its Gmail and Docs apps, and a majority of mobile devices shipped to schools are Chromebooks. Should the tremendous amounts of data underlying the operation of these kinds of services get into the wrong hands, our children’s futures could be at stake.

Concerns over illegitimate sharing of and access to student data have been raised by parent groups, consumer watchdogs, and privacy advocates, many of whom have begun public awareness campaigns and legal battles. They’re rightly worried, for example, about the fairness of college admissions processes that rely on student data profiles shared by personalized learning companies. Similarly, parents are concerned about the dispensation of financial awards including scholarships that are influenced by data that children have provided in surveys. In some cases the information doesn’t include just things like grades and test scores but also covers categories like race, religion, address and whether they have “impairments” like H.I.V. or depression.

Detroit school board: Charter schools should operate with elected boards – By Mark Hicks, The Detroit News

The Detroit school board is asking state education officials to support letting only institutions with elected boards to authorize charter schools in Michigan.

The group unanimously approved a resolution during a meeting Tuesday night that calls for the state to “limit the authorization of public school academies to institutions with independently elected boards of regents, trustees, governors or members.” 

The document noted that the Detroit Public Schools Community District is among the state’s 10 active charter school authorizers and the only one governed by an elected board.  Meanwhile, “the Non-Elected Charter Authorizers make decisions that impact local communities without accountability to voters,” the resolution says. “…Because public dollars are used to support charter schools — voters should have a vote in how such funds are spent and when charter schools are opened/closed.”

Departing board member LaMar Lemmons introduced the resolution at a board meeting this month after researching charter schools in the state. 

Could AISD Shutter 12 Schools? – By Austin Sanders, The Austin Chronicle

Austin Independent School District officials are considering closing 12 campuses, among other actions, to reduce the district's $29 million budget deficit, according to a document obtained by the Chronicle. The draft report says that each closed campus could save the district about $1 million, but it does not list which schools could be closed. The document does indicate that two campuses could be closed next year, seven in the 2020-21 school year, and three more in 2021-22.

A total of 91 potential budget reductions are listed in the document, which was not widely shared with the public or with members of the district's own Budget Stabilization Task Force, which has been working to finalize its own report on the topic. Of the items, which total about $55.1 million in potential savings annually, more than half would primarily impact AISD's central administration rather than its individual campuses and students, but the most controversial options would definitely be felt among the broader community.

In addition to school closures, these include cuts to the district's fine arts and bilingual academic programs – which are popular with parents and students – to save about $10.7 million. Another idea is to impose a sliding-scale fee for enrollment in the district's four magnet schools ($1.2 million in savings) to offset associated transportation costs.

Though the list represented new information to most of the community, it was discussed during a board work session Monday night, during which trustees expressed concerns. District 2 Trustee Jayme Mathiasasked Superintendent Paul Cruz when the board would need to vote on school consolidations or closures, which by prior board policy could happen as late as June; Cruz instead suggested March as a likely timeline for any such action.

Ohio Senate passes bill mandating students learn cursive by end of 5th grade – By Aris Foley, The Hill

The Ohio Senate passed a bill Thursday requiring each student in the state to be able to write in cursive by the end of the fifth grade. 

The measure, also known as House Bill 58, was passed by the Ohio Senate and would require the state’s Department of Education to craft a new curriculum for students before the start of next year. 

Under the new measure, students in the state would be required to legibly write letters in print by the end of third grade and write in cursive before going on to sixth grade.

According to a local Fox station, the Ohio House of Representatives first approved the bill in June. The legislation was first introduced in February 2017.

Any changes to the measure must reportedly be approved by the Ohio House before heading to Republican Gov. John Kasich to be signed.