After Bob Braun published a post breaking the news that Pearson was spying on students’ social media during PARCC testing, his blog was shut down. If you read his note below, it will not be clear to you, as it is not clear to me, whether his site was shut down by the attack or by him, “to stop the attack.” Frankly, I would have no idea how to shut down my site. If you clicked on the link, you got a screen that says, “This Account Has Been Suspended.”
Bob Braun posted this note on his Facebook page:
TO MY BLOG AND FACEBOOK FRIENDS: My site has been attacked and has been shut down to stop the attack. You might want to contact Pearson and let them know you don’t appreciate suppression of legitimate news.
https://www.facebook.com/bobbraunsledger/posts/643285842467702?fref=nf
Here is the text of the original post and here is the original link: http://bobbraunsledger.com/breaking-pearson-nj-spying-on-social-media-of-students-taking-parcc-tests/
MARCH 13, 2015
BREAKING: Pearson, NJ, spying on social media of students taking PARCC tests
” Pearson, the multinational testing and publishing company, is spying on the social media posts of students–including those from New Jersey–while the children are taking their PARCC, statewide tests, this site has learned exclusively. The state education department is cooperating with this spying and has asked at least one school district to discipline students who may have said something inappropriate about the tests.
This website discovered the unauthorized and hidden spying thanks to educators who informed it of the practice–a practice happening throughout the state and apparently throughout the country. The spying–or “monitoring,” to use Pearson’s word–was confirmed at one school district–the Watchung Hills Regional High School district in Warren by its superintendent, Elizabeth Jewett.
Jewett sent out an e-mail–posted here– to her colleagues expressing concern about the unauthorized spying on students. She said parents are upset and added that she thought Pearson’s behavior would contribute to the growing “opt out” movement.
In her email, Jewett said the district’s testing coordinator received a late night call from the state education department saying that Pearson had “initiated a Priority 1 Alert for an item breach within our school.”
The unnamed state education department employee contended a student took a picture of a test item and tweeted it. But it turned out the student had posted–at 3:18 pm, after testing was over–a tweet about one of the items with no picture. Jewett does not say the student revealed a question. Jewett continues:
“The student deleted the tweet and we spoke with the parent–who was obviously highly concerned as to her child’s tweets being monitored by the DOE (state education department).
“The DOE informed us that Pearson is monitoring all social media during the PARCC testing.”
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Diane, you should be able to find the entire text of the original post on Facebook here:
Uh yeah, I guess that link does work!
This just might be one of those times for PEARSON when the old adage, that all publicity is good publicity, is simply not true. Interesting times.
Makes you wonder what else in the universe Pearson controls!
Pearson is a sickness plaguing society.
I completely agree, but so has been the citizenry’s apathy for the past 30 years.
As anyone who has ever proctored a standardized test knows, students are never permitted to copy or discuss questions. They usually sign an agreement that says they won’t. I see nothing wrong with student social media being monitored to enforce this.
I’m not a huge fan of Pearson, but they are protecting their product, which is very expensive to produce, from being rendered invalid for future use in standardized tests.
Also, if anyone thinks Pearson is the only one monitoring students’ social media use, they’re dreaming.
If this was simply “protecting their product,” as if we were discussing pirated movies or something, I may side with you. However, this is a test our children are forced to take, and have to choice but to agree to the terms. Pearson can’t have it both ways. If they are going to make testing mandatory, therefor forcing children to enter into contracts that their parents aren’t even allowed to read or concent to, this is a different animal, my friend.
I would question how valid a NDA is (non-disclosure agreement) between a third party and minors for the reasons you stated. This is especially worriesome if parents are not aware of what students are agreeing to.
Contracts with children are legally unenforceable.
How old are these children? 16 is the age when a person can be held accountable for terms of a contract, including non-disclosure agreements. It isn’t freedom of speech, as one commenter opined. smh
they are protecting a product, that has been paid for by the tax payer, meaning the parents of the students taking that test. what a bunch of BS. I am opting my child out every year, but if she would take the test I would highly encourage her to let the whole world know, what these tests are all about, considering that we as parents are not even permitted to view the results of these ridiculous and erroneous tests.
“they are protecting their product, which is very expensive to produce” By trying to kill what turned out to be a fake fly with a sledge hammer? To me this reeks of corporate paranoia. A more likely explanation is that not only did they seek to protect their black box of a product, they sought to prevent people from finding out anything about the test that might be absurd or substandard, an ongoing problem for them.There is no doubt in my mind that this is also part of opposition research for them, done to discover trends in the opt out movement and among the opinions of the students themselves. That has little to do with defending a particular product and everything to do with defending their reputation. The result of their action: EPIC FAIL. This will be fully viral by the morning.
Yeah! If this is just a product, then we don’t have to buy it!
Copying test questions, okay, might pose academic integrity issues, but to forbid students from discussing test question after the fact? No, not unless the students have signed a non-disclosure agreement. I am not an attorney, but I believe that would be protected speech under the First Amendment.
The College Board makes kids “sign” an agreement not to discuss the AP Exams in any way, shape, or form. But at least they made this policy clear to parents as well, at least to any who were paying attention and reading the Fine Print…
Students were allowed to have phones in testing? As to sharing info about the tests after they are over, to expect that students will not discuss them is silly. Usually, that seems to take the form of general questions about reactions to sections or types of questions not content. If Pearson wants to read tweets, let them. They are not exactly private. As long as no attempts are made to track down “tweeters” by using information beyond the tweet, who can really object? Tweeting is not exactly private. It makes me uncomfortable to think that they have people snooping through the aether in an attempt to police test chatter, but it doesn’t surprise me, and it shouldn’t surprise anyone else.
2o2t, the district superintendent said the student tweeted after 3pm/after dismissal. Bob reports that NJ DoE apparently wanted student punished.
Pearson did more than “read tweets.” In fact, according to the article, they did attempt to “track down the (tweeter) by using information beyond the tweet.” That late night phone call from the DOE to the test coordinator came as a response from the test maker contacting the DOE to alert them to the “breach within (that particular) school.” What happened next? The school had to review the tweet in question, which meant that the school now had to turn its attention to a single student’s social activity.
This is far above and beyond simply reading tweets. This is close tracking and then taking action on students’ natural need to discuss their experience of a test AFTER having completed it.
Also note: students are NOT allowed to have phones during testing. This tweet went out AFTER school hours. Once the new common core tests came in, the NYC DOE, for one, implemented a mandatory digital device COLLECTION before exams. Prior to that, students were instructed to turn off any devices they had and to put them into their backpacks (which were kept far from students during testing) or in their lockers.
Being that Pearson no longer plays by the rules, we shouldn’t either. I think we should render these immoral tests invalid. I call this civil disobedience. In my view, they fired the first shop so we will finish it.
And now a foreign U.K. company is not only controlling American education, they are spying on our kids. Where is tea party outrage when you need it? To borrow from Paul Revere, one if by land, two if by sea, three if by PARCC.
If we were really concerned about learning, tests would be designed to ENCOURAGE discussion and promote transparency. I designed tests such that students were free to take them home, openly discuss, and share solutions. Students had to demonstrate problem solving and understand in multiple ways. I knew my students. And it certainly was not expensive as I was paid a starting teacher’s salary for many years. With PARCC ccrap, those days are gone.
The standardized tests are impersonal, mechanistic, and completely miss the point of assessment. If the tests were designed as tools to help the teachers rather than punish them, we would not need strong armed tactics and clandestine black ops monitoring Facebook, text messages, and hallway conversations. It is not a “product” for profit we should be protecting. It is freedom to learn. What’s next? Department of Homeroom Security?
“What’s next? Department of Homeroom Security?” LOL! Sorry, this is hilarious!
Math Vale: precisely!
😎
Great point, MathVale!
Apparently, “homeroom” would include at home, quite literally, not just at school.
Yes!!! So well-stated, MathVale. I love your test style—it respects learners as human beings who learn best through rich engagement, including discussion, as well as taking the the time to let ideas percolate and to examine them from multiple angles.
I agree with you, too, that tests can and should be a learning experience as much as a measure of how students think, problem-solve, and draw conclusions. Tests should, indeed, encourage discussion and transparency.
Exactly: moreover as a teacher I feel like we are being setup. I am not supposed to look at the exam. But if another “pineapple question” comes along and a child does not graduate high school due to a flawed test question, I am supposed to not know this. Basically Pearson is afraid that poorly constructed test questions might be outed and so children and adults are stifled so they can maintain a monopoly.
I think we should have a problem forcing a kid to take a test and then forcing the kid to sign something agreeing to never talk about it (I’m ok with them being forbidden from discussion until all administrations are over).
I’ve never, as a teacher, been asked to sign such a declaration myself, but I would refuse.
Peter Greene explains why their product stinks:
http://curmudgucation.blogspot.com/2015/03/pearson-prove-parcc-stinks.html
Again, if this is just a product, then we don;t have to buy it!
teachers are not allowed to discuss or even see the tests. You cannot expect students to not talk about something that they have had to sit through for days on end. I have never had my students sign anything like that.
To me, it’s not the tracking. It’s the steps after that are the problem. Pearson found out who those children are, contacted NJDOE, who in turn contacted the Superintendent of their school and suggested disciplinary action. That is way too Big Brother for me.
It should be rendered invalid. It’s a ridiculous test.
If you truly believe this, then you believe the rights of a corporation to protect its product are more important than the rights of a child.
You cannot morally force a child to not talk about something he/she was forced to do. That’s corrupt.
In Texas, students do NOT sign any agreement except the “honor statement” saying that they won’t cheat. And even the signing of statement cannot be forced. If they don’t sign it, they simply go ahead and take the test.
I don’t get any message that Bob’s site has been shut down. Instead, I get an intermittent error when trying to access Bob’s post that the resource limit has been reached and after trying a few times I can get through … To me this means that the traffic to Bob’s page is temporarily exceeding the bandwidth allotted to it – in other words, his post has created a heck of a lot of interest.
My thoughts exactly. This is what the initial stages of something going viral look like.
It also is what a ping attack would look like.
What you do is send a whole bunch of ‘pings’ (which are internet packets which ask for a return acknowledgement) to an address. It overwhelms the network card of the server/computer being attacked.
It’s easy to do. I’ve had 12th graders who could/did do it from one of our computer lab computers. District nearly shut down lab for a month. We ended going off on students and self monitoring much more closely. By the way, those students were making more than me three years after graduating from HS.
There was a different message about an hour ago Kimi, but you are right, that it now seems to be back the the “Resource Limit is Reached” message from earlier this evening. Viral doesn’t begin to cover what is happening with this story…
The logical conclusion is Pearson is also monitoring students’ social media during the Smarter Balanced Test. Can’t wait to hear proof of that!
The student did NOT have a phone in the testing room. He tweeted something about the test after school, and did not attach an image. With 140 character limit, not much could have been shared/compromised. I am concerned about Pearson’s monitoring like this, then finding out which school/district he was from and contacting the superintendent. Was what was posted unethical? I don’t know. Did Pearson folks make a mistake here that will bite them in the @–? I hope so. IF they are behind DDOS attacks and/or account suspensions of Bob Braun’s and “Big Education APE’s” sites, they aren’t playing fair. Some of us decided to keep Pearson’s surveillance system busy by tweeting/posting messages with “PARCC” in them.
Wonder if the system deciphers pig Latin?
I like your solution. All you tweeters…#PARCC!
The Superintendent received a phone call at home at 10:00 pm. There was no picture taken. It was a tweet mentioning the test (we don’t have the actual tweet but what could it really be in 140 characters?). They wanted the student punished. These are minors. There is so much wrong with this.
Let us ponder….. Is it against the law for a student to post a detailed recap of the PARCC test after he/she has taken it and gone home?
Does anyone know? Are students allowed to discuss the test item specifics after taking the test? Can they discuss particulars with their parents?
Wow……
If a student can write a detailed recap in 140 characters, he doesn’t need the test. Someone should hire him! PARCC only identified one student they could demand be disciplined?
Imagine the conversation,
Little Patrick comes home from 3rd grade and his mom asks, “so how was the big test your school has spent so much time preparing for?”
Patrick: ” a man named Hespie said I am not allowed to talk about it or I’ll get in big trouble. You might get in trouble too, mommy. I know you told me not to keep secrets but I HAVE TOO”
I find it hilarious that Pearson calls it a, “priority one alert”! Like it is DEFCON 1 or something! I can imaging red lights flashing and airraid sirens going off at Pearson HQ! Hey Pearson, get a grip you losers! It’s a standardized test, and a bad one at that, not a nuclear attack. Oh and, stop stalking kids…it is kind of pedo.
My thoughts exactly. I can picture black helicopters filled with SWAT teams circling this school, zooming in on that kid’s house.
Come to think of it, Dienne, as I left a pro-public school rally last night, there were several helicopters flying right over the building! Hmmm.
Most blogs can be hacked, sabotaged, and shut down by the ruling class and the agents of corporate dictatorship. Substancenews.net, the website that I edit, and which comes from Substance (now 40 years old in Chicago) was cut in late December 2014 and we didn’t get back on line for three weeks. We decided to leave the gap in our BACK ISSUES, which are available going back now to 2002 from the Home Page at substancenews.net. The ruling class is likely to continue to suppress the truth, and this story about Pearson really has them frosted. Already they are confused about what to say about PARCC, with Arne Duncan in Chicago two days ago claiming that the Dept. of Education was not going to take away money from schools Opting Out of PARCC, while the Illinois State Board of Education has told schools that they would lose THOUSANDS IF NOT MILLIONS OF DOLLARS!!! if they allowed the kids to Opt Out. While most well informed parents and teachers know that ISBE’s Koch and Meeks are lying, getting the facts out requires vast cooperation. Hence, we are publishing Bob Braun’s analysis of the Pearson spying at our website, and hope others will spread it as well. The reasons for Pearson’s fascism is clear: They will lose hundreds of millions of dollars (local, state, and national contracts for PARCC and other stuff) when we finally end the reign of the Testocracy. Although Pearson’s monstrous mistakes have been proved for more than a decade (see Bracey’s report on the Minnesota lawsuit), Pearson’s clout with corporate “school reform” will continue until we defeat it.
Big Brother is watching … and he’s a test-maker, so you’d better not cheat!! For that matter, you’d better not try to start a conversation on social media about anything pertaining to the tests you take, because Big Brother Test Maker must keep all test related information shrouded in the utmost secrecy! Come to think of it … be careful what you say about the tests in public.
I want to know why our children and their rights are secondary to those of a giant company who makes enormous profits in the name of those same children. (Remember, Pearson is just in the business of making tests, but also the very curricula that is used to teach children world-wide.)
I also want to know why the very people who are most effected by these tests—children, families, teachers, school officials—must be sworn to secrecy, rather than maintain their unalienable rights of liberty.
Note: Liberty is defined by dictionary.com as “freedom from control, interference, obligation, restriction, hampering conditions, etc.; power or right of doing, thinking, speaking, etc., according to choice” and by Merriam-Webster as, “the quality or state of being free:
a : the power to do as one pleases
b : freedom from physical restraint
c : freedom from arbitrary or despotic control
d : the positive enjoyment of various social, political, or economic rights and privileges
e : the power of choice”
Our liberty, in this case, is thwarted by the interests of an education service provider who apparently has earned the consent of our own government, which ought to uphold our rights.
To add, this liberty is derived from NATURAL LAW according to our Enlightenment friends. In addition, this right derives from us, the people. And to uphold this right, it is our right, our duty, to remove any type of power or authority from those who will attempt to abridge this right of liberty. Therefore, being that our government is supposed to protect this right, it should do so by legally restraining this company. If the government refuses to protect this right from this tyrannical company (and natural law supersedes any contract), then it is our right as citizens to remove from power those who do not want to protect this liberty right. (Thank you Mr. John Locke).
Big Data gathering more data: protecting its investment or collecting data to sell?
This points out the danger we are all in now that the media is controlled by 6 or 7 corporations. Whether mass media or social media, the concentration of power in ominous.
The link to Bob Braun’s site is not available:( The truth always hurts!
Good Grief! What is wrong with people? I don’t agree with a national standardized test. I believe in local control for the testing and assessment of schools. This “paranoia” that people are carrying on about PARCC is ridiculous. I’m embarrassed that people a admire are encouraging this false, paranoid, delusion of some secret plot. This particular article is a prime example. Where is this tweet? I’m not saying it didn’t happen, but my guess is this teen, watching grown ups freak out over a test, tweeted a question from the test and probably included a hashtag which alerted a system to prevent cheating. No one is silencing anyone. There are articles, comments, interviews of teens, adults, congressmen, and many more that have taken the PARCC and their feedback. They haven’t been “targeted or stalked”. I’m guessing it’s because they spoke with out revealing an actual question or answer from the actual test. No one is spying on your kids, trust me, I have a Twitter and Facebook account. Some teens need to have their access taken away. Have you seen the garbage they post? Pearson probably has a system that monitors specific tag words to be able to catch someone posting test questions on the Internet to prevent cheating. Believe me when I say, teens use hashtags and have people with less scruples than Pearson following them. Oh, and those same teens put more personal information on Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, Instagram, YouTube, Vine, and everywhere else than anything gathered by Pearson.
Daisy,
I wish you were right. The CEO of Sun Microsystems said many years ago, “You have zero privacy anyway. Get over it.” Your children have zero zero zero privacy.Everything about them will be data mined. Knewton will be tracking their eye movements as they log on and take the tests. http://curmudgucation.blogspot.com/2014/03/who-puts-scary-in-pearson-meet-knewton.html
You are missing the point. People should have the right to say and do idiotic things. That, my friend, is called liberty. What is idiotic to you may not be to someone else. As long as you do not do willful harm against someone, you should be free to do what you want. By the way, no matter what the Supreme Court says, I will never ever consider a corporation to be a person. Therefore, you can harm it all you want.
Daisy, what do you care? According to your bio, you’ve been on several charter school boards so I’m guessing your children are attending charters. Charters are NOT held accountable to these exams as public schools are, and they have everything to gain from the negative impact they have on their public school “competitors”. SO easy for you to take a high-horse stance when your children are most likely not impacted by Pearson’s influence.
Daisy, while I agree that the veracity of the post needs to be verified and that it is unlikely that Pearson uses a “novel” technique for scouring social media, the fact the Pearson needs to do this at all is a testament to the lunacy of the standardized testing culture. Tests should be transparent in every sense of the word, and kids and teachers should be allowed to discuss them to help foster their education. A gag order on discussing test questions illustrates Pearson’s desperation to control people that they don’t deserve to control. They have ZERO accountability in writing and grading the tests, and therefore, they have NO right to monitor anyone’s tweets, FB posts, etc.
The whole educational “emergency” with standardized testing is a sham, starting with the PISA international test. Remember, that our entire educational system’s reform is being driven by a single day in the life of a 15 year old (who likely doesn’t really care about the test).
Imagine if every student tweeted something about the test after taking it. PRIORITY 1 ALERT!!!! <>> Pearson will have to have a security division to send out testing police to schools to drag away millions of teenagers.
I would love for this to happen!
The real question should be what precisely is Pearson “monitoring”.
Some might view adults (at Pearson) “monitoring” little boys and girls as much more than simply “business related”.
What are the Pearson Perverts (TM) doing, precisely?
And who at Pearson is involved and has knoweldge of what is going on? The CEO?
The real jobs of the future will be people monitoring video cameras, phones and other devices to catch wrongdoings. Ahhh…technology giveth and technology taketh away. This is what we get when we “buy into” (love that phrase!) the notion that technology is our God and can give us everything we need.
The punishment clearly should be that the student is not allowed to take the test. /snark
Shades of Google Apps for Education? It’s one thing to monitor comments made using hashtags, as they are public. Is quite another to monitor private comments. Big brother IS watching and given that, in this capacity, Pearson/PARCC is acting as a state contractor, if not a federal contractor pursuant to RTTT, First and Fourth Amendment free speech and privacy protections apply. I smell a nice lawsuit.
SHARE SHARE SHARE.
Do not let our Free Speech be infringed.
Ugh, not good.
I think it’s a valid reality check question, Diane: Has Bob checked with the web host provider for the straight dope? I’m wondering if his account was suspended due to excessive bandwidth usage.
Absent any official word, I’m wondering if this is just a byproduct of his post being *too* popular, as it were. Not that that’s a bad thing! It’s just that, if his web hosting account is only allowed so much usage, there can be automated suspensions for crossing that line (as opposed to just charging more, because some hosting providers don’t have the means to do that automatically).
Of course, if it turns out it *was* somehow ordered to be censored …
Reblogged this on Crazy Normal – the Classroom Exposé and commented:
Bob Braun posted this note on his Facebook page: TO MY BLOG AND FACEBOOK FRIENDS: My site has been attacked and has been shut down to stop the attack. You might want to contact Pearson and let them know you don’t appreciate suppression of legitimate news.
Please support the parents in NJ by signing up for the Thunderclap https://www.thunderclap.it/projects/23636-parcc-is-invading-our-privacy?locale=en
Also, if Pearson is just trying to protect its “product,” then 1. we don’t have to buy it, 2. the students didn’t buy it, 3. when we buy products, we can say anything we want about it – good or bad. When I buy Doritos, do I have to sign a contract saying I won’t discuss the product?
Blogging about first amendment violations causes more first amendment violations. My blog has a much smaller readership than Bob’s but we’ll see if Pearson gives me grief too.
I believe that the DOE should be investigated for possible kickbacks to Pearson. They seem to be jumping through hoops for them!
*kickbacks *from Pearson….
Reblogged this on QORQ PRODUCTIONS WORDS ABOUT MUSIC and commented:
Criminal. Reblog repost, link and share the hell outta this.
One of the reasons we have been doing a website (rather than a blog) at substancenews.net in Chicago for more than a decade is that blogs are more vulnerable to hacking and cracking. We immediately republished Bob Braun’s dramatic expose about Pearson, adding it to the ongoing list of Pearson atrocities that we have been publishing since Jerry Bracey began noting Pearson’s predations in his “Rotten Apples” (which we also published) more than ten years ago. That came after Pearson screwed up the scoring of the Minnesota high school “exit” exams and cost dozens (perhaps hundreds) of high schoolers in Minnesota their college careers and possible financial aid. By the time Pearson was brought to justice in the courts, as Bracey reported then, the damage had been done. But Pearson has continued, year after year, because corporate “school reform” wants it that way. Like the big banks, Pearson, at least under the current reign of neoliberal fanatics like Rahm Emanuel, Barack Obama, and Arne Duncan is too big to fail, no matter how many nasty things it does and how much failure in its record.
The Bib Braun Ledger is a small local blog which got inundated with hits today. Unless he is paying for teh extra data his site will go down. Can he provide information of a DoS?