How do we protect the privacy of learners in the digital age? Who owns student information? What rights should students have to control their academic digital footprint?

1. A Student’s Right to Privacy
in the
Age of Digital Learning
Prepared for The Association for Media Literacy
by
Heidi Siwak
Saturday April 6

2. A Digital Learning Revolution!
• Social Media and e-tools for collaboration are
connecting learners globally.
• Students are conducting learning in publicly
visible, digitally connected spaces.
• Teachers and students are documenting
learning and co-creating digital footprints.
• Fascinating and compelling projects are
everywhere!

3. I’m a part of the Web 2.0 explosion.

4. Blog: document learning and practices

5. Tweet

6. Hana Global Twitter Chat

7. We collaborate globally on original
projects

8. We are globally connected.

9. We create images of learning.

10. We document our learning.

11. We create media in digital spaces.

12. My early concerns …

13. Media Literacy Triangle

14. Education’s Uncritical Adoption of New
Technologies and Digital Tools

15. Alarm Bells
Corporations through digital
collaborative tools and
educational partnerships are
gaining unprecedented access
to information about learners
and learning.

16. We work in the public sector, yet ..

17. Google Certified Prime Minister?

18. How do we protect the privacy of learners?
Who owns their information?
What controls should students have over the
digital identity constructed through the work
they are asked to do because of school?
Who profits from their work?
What should educators be thinking about as we
build globally connected classrooms?

19. The architecture of the tools we
use is political. They will evolve
our political system.
Cory Doctorow referencing Electronic
Frontier Foundation

20. Tracking Apps

21. What are we doing?
• Turning student records that up until now were
kept locked in the OSR, over to the private sector
• Creating digital dossiers of learners that have the
potential to follow them for life
• We have no control over how that information
will be used in the future
• Being done with very little supervision
• Students have no real control over their personal
information
• We have no idea of long-term consequences

22. I love the idea of this app, but …

23. What have your students agreed to?

24. TOS: Terms of Service Agreements
• You understand that by posting information or
content on the Website or otherwise providing
content, materials or information to Company or in
connection with the Services (collectively, "User
Submissions"), Company hereby is and shall be
granted a non exclusive, worldwide, royalty free,
perpetual, irrevocable, and transferable right to fully
exploit such User Submissions (including all related
intellectual property rights) and to allow others to do
so;
• however, Company will only share your personally
identifiable information in accordance with Company's
current privacy policy

25. Acclimatizing Students to a
Culture of Surveillance

26. Political consequences as governments change
Employment consequences
Fear of exposure
Powerlessness

27. Alarm Bell 2: Action Research
• Observe learning in action.
• Document learning.
• Share learning via
blogs, twitter, video, images
• Construct messages about our
classrooms, schools and the people who
inhabit those spaces.

28. When does it cross the line into
exploitation?
(The video for this slide was removed.
It was a clip from an Action Research
year long project. The scene showed a
young girl clearly not wanting to be
filmed, yet powerless to stop the
teacher from filming her and
uploading it to You Tube

29. When the social and emotional
well-being of the child becomes
less important than the teachers’
and schools’ desire to document
and share learning.

31. It’s time for a step back.

32. Our Responsibility
To protect children in the learning spaces we
control, that includes digital spaces.
To respect students’ rights to privacy.
To protect anonymity as students grow and
develop under our supervision.
To advocate for better privacy protections.

33. It’s time for
Student Digital Rights

34. Control Over Their Work

35. Privacy By Design

36. HWDSB Learning Commons
Blogging platform hosted in house.
No analytics collected.

37. Where can students find information
on their rights?
• http://aclu-
wa.org/student-rights-
and-responsibilities-
digital-age-guide-public-
school-students-
washington-state
• Not much out there!

38. What recourse do students have?

39. How can students access and
delete their personal data?

40. How do we continue to build
globally connected classrooms
and enjoy the opportunities
that digital learning provides
WHILE protecting the right to
privacy that our children are
entitled to ?

41. Links:
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/31/technology/web-privacy-and-how-consumers-let-down-their-
guard.html?ref=technology&_r=1&
Cory Doctorow: Is it Time For a Privacy Revolution? http://blip.tv/alaoif/cory-doctorow-privacy-is-it-time-for-a-
revolution-1087690 Important: how we conflate private and secrecy
Twitter: @privacycamp #privacy @privacydigest
Students tracked through RFID http://www.pcworld.com/article/2011352/texas-school-uses-rfid-badges-to-
track-student-locations.html
Electronic Frontier Foundation: https://www.eff.org/issues/privacy
Common Sense Media: http://www.commonsensemedia.org/educators