California Sends Two Student Data Privacy Bills To Governor

By Christine Kern, contributing writer

California has taken the lead in student data privacy and sent two bills to Gov. Jerry Brown. SB 1177 lays out privacy guidelines for operators of Internet websites, online services, online applications, and mobile application, while AB 1584 deals with contracts between local educational agencies and third-party technology vendors.

While federal student privacy legislation including the Federal Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) and the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) address student data privacy, educators, privacy advocates, legislators, and industry members are divided about whether that legislation does enough to protect privacy in our present digital age. The Center for Digital Education reports, although new federal legislation was introduced in late July, some states have been moving to address the issue on their own, with at least 83 bills in 32 states being considered this year as of April, according to the Data Quality Campaign.

“There really was very little if any protection that would guard the security, the privacy, the confidentiality of student information,” said Rick Pratt, chief consultant to the Assembly Education Committee, “and so hopefully bills 1584 and 1177 will provide some security and privacy where it doesn’t exist in current law right now.”

SB 1177 is designed to stop the practices of some companies in the technology industry that have built student data profiles for advertising purposes, targeted advertising to students with this information, and used it for other non-educational purposes. Google made the news earlier this year for scanning student email for advertising purposes, though it later reversed its policy.

The bill was introduced by Senate President pro Tem Darrell Steinberg (D-Sacramento) earlier this year.

“It’s a very positive piece of legislation that I hope will better protect student privacy,” said Bradley S. Shear, a digital privacy lawyer with Shear Law in Maryland. “My hope is that the legislation helps spur bad actors in the ed tech space to really change their behavior and really make student privacy a priority.”

Joan Buchanan (D-Alamo) introduced AB 1584 this year after a parent in Buchanan’s district discovered that his children’s school district had a contract with a mobile app developer that did not put any restrictions on how the developer could use the student data that it collected — and parents were not informed. Similar situations had occurred in other school districts.

AB 1584 “would authorize a local educational agency, as defined, pursuant to a policy adopted by its governing board or governing body, as appropriate, to enter into a contract with a third party, as defined, to provide services for the digital storage, management, and retrieval of pupil records, as defined, or to provide digital educational software, or both. The bill would require the contract to include specified provisions, including a statement that the pupil records continue to be the property of and under the control of the local educational agency, a description of the actions the third party will take to ensure the security and confidentiality of pupil records, and a description of how the local educational agency and the 3rd party will jointly ensure compliance with the federal Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act. The bill would require that a contract that fails to comply with the requirements of this bill be rendered void if certain conditions are satisfied.”

Together, these two bills would give students stronger privacy protection, lay out clear rules of the road for vendors and establish requirements for third-party contracts with local educational agencies.

“Together, it’s really a landmark regulatory scheme,” said Joni Lupovitz, vice president of policy for Common Sense Media, which supported the bills. “The whole idea is not to stop education technology; the idea is to create a trusted online environment so kids can just be kids and focus on learning.”

Gov. Jerry Brown has until Sept. 30 to sign or veto these bills, along with other bills that involve computer science education.