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Eastchester Letter: Protect Your Child's Privacy

EASTCHESTER, N.Y. -- The Eastchester Daily Voice accepts signed letters to the editor. Send letters to eastchester@dailyvoice.com.

To the editor:

As you are aware, the Eastchester School District has opted out of Race to the Top in protest over the State Education Department’s (SED) approach to storing confidential student data. However, the district remains concerned about maintaining the confidentiality of children’s school information.

SED is committed to allowing a private company, inBloom Inc., to track students from kindergarten through high school by storing myriad data points such as socio-economic data, test scores, special education and disciplinary records.

inBloom Inc. plans to store all of this information in storage clouds but has stated that it “cannot guarantee the security of the information stored… or that the information will not be intercepted when it is being transmitted.” There have been several newspaper articles on this topic, including this extensive one in The New York Times that ran in October.

We urge parents to demand that SED terminates the agreement with inBloom or gives parents the right to “opt out” or refuse to have their students’ information uploaded.

The New York State Assembly passed two bills that would block student data-sharing without consent or would allow for parental opt out. Those bills are now before the New York State Senate (Bills S.5930 and S.5932).

State Sen. George Latimer, needs to be urged to support these bills. He needs to hear from his constituents.

To send the letter to Senator Latimer, please click here for the Support Student Privacy letter. You will need to complete all entry fields and click the button at the bottom.

In addition, we want to make it clear to the Board of Regents and the Department of Education that we have grave concerns about this issue. Therefore, Regent Harry Philips (area representative) and Commissioner John King will be copied on the letter.

Once you hit “submit,” your digitally signed letter will be automatically sent to Senator Latimer (latimer@nysenate.gov ), Regent Phillips (RegentPhillips@mail.nysed.gov) and Commissioner King (jking@mail.nysed.gov). You may also send a letter by mail or fax to Senator Latimer or call his office.

Senator George Latimer - District Office 222 Grace Church Street Port Chester, NY 10573 Phone: 914-934-5250 Fax: 914-0934-5256

Thank you for your attention to this most critical matter.

Sincerely, Mary Messner Martin and Willa Brody, Co-chairs Eastchester Board of Education Community Relations and Advocacy Advisory Committee

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