In the last few months, I’ve heard from parents and community members regarding student data security and privacy in BVSD. With the passing of HB 16-1423 last summer, I wanted to take a moment to share how we’re implementing the requirements of this law and improving on measures we’ve already started in protecting our student data.
First, we have dedicated resources for the security of our network. These include a security engineer whose responsibility it is to keep our data secure. We’ve added a vendor manager to work directly with our negotiated contracts in making sure that they maintain their level of security and support. Also, we’ve moved our data into a more secure location.
In addition, our legal department has created a Data Protection Addendum (DPA). This is a required document that must be signed and followed by every vendor that we contract with that uses and collects personally identifiable information of our students. The DPA provides guidelines and expectations for how the vendor is able to use, store and dispose of our student data. You can find the BVSD standard DPA here. If a vendor is unable or refuses to sign the DPA, then we do not purchase the software.
The new law also requires that school districts provide a list of “on-demand” or non-contracted resources that teachers use with students. These generally free online tools are available for our students to use, and it is up to the teacher to determine if the tool a student is using online meets appropriate requirements for age and privacy.
Finally, we’ve created a professional learning course that helps teachers learn how to find and understand the privacy policy and terms of use for the online tools that they are using in class. If a teacher determines that a tool meets these standards and plans on implementing the tool with students, he or she submits the name of that tool to an online form so that we can collect and maintain this list as a district. You can view the list on our website.
As our district continues to implement these measures, I invite you to follow our website as it will be kept up-to-date with the changes to help you and your family understand how data is secure in BVSD. And please let me know what you think by commenting below.
Andrew
