Nelson McLeod at Richard Montgomery HS must need a lot of reteaching and reinforcing. He still insists on breaking federal student privacy laws by posting student's personal identifiable information - in this case who owes money to the school - by ID numbers, so its time for the annual reminder concerning the obligations wall.
Here are two pictures sent to me this evening:
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| Redacted list of Student ID numbers as seen on bulletin board at Richard Montgomery High School 6/14/11 |
Once again, to reinforce the original concept that apparently was not learned, here is my short primer on FERPA and the Obligation Wall.
Given that this is a widespread and recurring problem in MCPS - maybe Dr. McLeod's actions can be considered within the "egregious" category. We'll ask the federal Department of Education to withhold funding for Richard Montgomery.
I wonder if Dr. Starr noticed the violation when he was at Richard Montgomery tonight. If we are really lucky, Dr. Starr should be able to address this stiuation immediately - perhaps he can give Dr. McLeod a personal lesson over coffee.
For those of you who would like to know more about educational privacy rights, here is the short version of FERPA.
The Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) is the federal privacy act equivalent for educational records. All schools that receive federal funding are subject to FERPA. FERPA is a personal right - that is, the cause of action may only be brought by the individual whose rights have been violated. For example, only a student or parent of a student named on the "obligations wall" (at Richard Montgomery, Blake, or Whitman) or public HSA remedial list (Blair) is entitled to file a complaint with the US Department of Education. If my child's rights aren't violated, sorry, no right to complain.
Remedies are mostly corrective - the objectives are get the school or school system to fix their policies and procedures. However, the regulations do permit the Department of Education to withhold funding for egregious cases - see 34 CFR 99.61 et seq.
As a lawyer involved in freedom of information and privacy act issues, most people I know outside of MCPS who deal with records subject to the privacy act or educational research and testing work very diligently to comply with the various requirements of the applicable privacy laws and regulations. MCPS is rather cavalier in its interpretations - but then again, that seems consistent with MCPS believing that most laws and policies are meant for others. I know I've spoken with my kids schools about having volunteers helping out with mailing interims, but didn't get very far, since the school claimed the volunteers were working just like school staff. How fascinating. I've only had one instance that I know about where my child's name was on the "obligations wall," and at that point I was more concerned about whether she could purchase a homecoming ticket than I was about filing a FERPA complaint.
So - given that this is a recurring problem in MCPS - maybe this posting has risen to the level of an "egregious" case and ask the federal Department of Education to withhold funding for Richard Montgomery.
More on FERPA is on the Department of Education's website:http://www.ed.gov/policy/gen/guid/fpco/ferpa/index.html
See the original post at: Short Primer on FERPA and "Obligations Wall"
