Blogger Victoria Young warns about the voracious appetite of the Data Monster.
It is coming for your children.
She writes:
“Will we one-day look back and wonder why we let Big Data devour our children’s lives in bits and bytes?
Will we scratch our heads in confusion over why we let data become a major driver in so many aspects of our lives?
“Surely we can see that the tech giants are profiting while the greater society suffers? Maybe not.
“But we do know that Americans care about their own right to privacy.
The issue of who is gathering information and what information is being gathered is considered to be an important dimension of privacy control by nearly all American adults.” Pew Research Center (Views About Data Collection and Security)
“But I wonder, why don’t Americans care about protecting children from the BIG DATA Monster?
“When the biggest concern directing the nation is the workforce/military supply-chain for the global economy, it makes perfect sense to allow the tech industry to have access to all education, health, employment, and income records. And what could go wrong with that?”
Read it all.
“Will we one-day look back and wonder why we let Big Data devour our children’s lives in bits and bytes?
Will we scratch our heads in confusion over why we let data become a major driver in so many aspects of our lives?
Surely we can see that the tech giants are profiting while the greater society suffers? Maybe not.
But we do know that Americans care about their own right to privacy.
“The issue of who is gathering information and what information is being gathered is considered to be an important dimension of privacy control by nearly all American adults.” Pew Research Center (Views About Data Collection and Security)
“But I wonder, why don’t Americans care about protecting children from the BIG DATA Monster?
“When the biggest concern directing the nation is the workforce/military supply-chain for the global economy, it makes perfect sense to allow the tech industry to have access to all education, health, employment, and income records. And what could go wrong with that?”
She says contact your legislator by 11/15, but I didn’t get this in time for that deadline. Contact them now.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
They don’t even use data themselves. DeVos makes up statistics and when she’s called on it she points to a Dell-backed forum, where they also make up statistics:
“Sweeping, unsourced claims like this about the future economy are not uncommon — and seem to be a driving force behind some policymakers’ approach to education. The fact that DeVos’s go-to number isn’t backed up by evidence raises questions about the foundation of her view that schools need dramatic overhaul.
After citing the 65 percent figure, DeVos continued, saying, “You have to think differently about what the role of education and preparation is.”
I can’t believe these people have the gall to go into public schools and scold us about “rigor”. This isn’t science- it’s marketing. It makes me wonder how well DeVos was educated, frankly, that she swallows this stuff whole and regurgitates it without the slightest bit of effort to find out if it has any basis in fact. Why was this “fact” accepted and repeated by the United States government? Why should we rely on anything else she says?
https://www.chalkbeat.org/posts/us/2017/11/21/to-back-up-claim-that-schools-must-change-devos-cites-made-up-statistic-about-the-future-of-work/
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Chiara: “t makes me wonder how well DeVos was educated, frankly, that she swallows this stuff whole and regurgitates it without the slightest bit of effort to find out if it has any basis in fact. ”
You keep forgetting that the wealthy have better brains, better genes and have higher intelligence. That comes from tRump and who can dispute him. (He always picks the best due to his superior intelligence.)
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Beat me to the punch with that one, carolmalaysia!
My comment is that she is very well schooled in evangelical fundie religious regressive right dogma and ideology.
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Lately I’ve been OD’ing a bit on StarTrak reruns. This, Kirk’s takeaway from Khan’s superiority hubris in a clip from last evening’s rerun of “Space Seed”…
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Stealing private data and telling public lies–
Just a data-day thing for those who privatize.
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Everyone should read the whole post! Victoria Young is one of the most astute observers and writers that there is, especially on education.
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Our representatives are for sale to the highest bidder. Democracy cannot function when those with the fattest wallets dictate policies.
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A worthwhile read. I wish it had covered more of the abuse that hides in algorithms in using the data. Cathy O’Neil (@mathbabe) covers these well and I recommend everyone in education start paying attention to what Cathy is writing. (Start with her book “Weapons of Math Destruction”.)
So, yes, privacy and abuse of the data to outside sources is a major concern. But also, we should be very concerned about how bad algorithms are used in ways that embed prejudice — or at the very least drive unfair decisions because the algorithms are never checked for validity.
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A great report. HR 4147 is just one of the bills designed to create a national surveillance system under the pretext of wanting data-driven-decisions.
Another impetus to the big-data push in education is coming from the bait of “free” educational materials. One of the new players is Amazon Education. Amazon Education will be offering FREE stuff to educators. And, in tandem with cuts to school budgets, it is clear why Amazon, along with so many billionaires, have been pushing open source content and other freebies. These materials are not really free. They are instruments for data-gathering. Big data pays big dividends.
Data-gathering on individual students has been enabled the weakening of FERPA . That did not make much news, but privacy of individual student and teacher information is easily breeched, not just by hacking. Software already in circulation can neutralize “privacy” policies. If you take time to read privacy policies, you see that the policies are written to get the primary seller off the hook for third party vendors and the providers of the “platforms” that give you access to a product or service.
Consider Amazon Education (AE). AE wants to capture teacher-generated content in addition to everything else they can market as free. The business plan, still in development, is see a whole batch of related products. So, if a science lesson gets a lot of hits, and the lab component calls for supplies, Amazon will sell you these, and perhaps some age-appropriate books on the topic. Amazon intends to do a minimal triage on the inventory it acquires, in order to show the lessons/products are aligned with the Common Core. Otherwise, the merit of a lesson, unit, any resource will be determined by customer reviews–likely down the road skewed reports offered as a premium service from AE. For content, you can be sure there will be a preference for content in little chunks suitable for mastery as required for claims that the content fits with personalized learning.
Today, of course, we learn that new rules are in the making for internet access. The FCC intends to eliminate net neutrality. That will certainly put a damper on the idea that screen-based digital delivery of education via the internet will become the new normal in education.
The data gathering necessary for that vision of the future can still be accomplished, but not with the ease available under net neutrality. Instead, access to the Internet will be under the terms set by the major Internet service providers (ISPs). Mine is Time-Warner/Spectrum. The ISPs will be competing for market share and profits. They will also be competing with “innovators” who are supposed to be waiting in the wings and eager to get in into the ISP business.
With net neutrality gone, and no obvious guarantees for discounts or subsidies for education (e.g., e-rate), access to the Internet will be best and fastest for the people who can pay the most. Moreover, to register complaints about being priced out of access to the Internet, individuals and groups will have to raise the issue with Federal Trade Commission, not the FCC.
Unlike many promoters of personalized learning, I am not a fan of making education dependent on Internet services.The internet is a wonderful tool, and like many others, I have become dependent upon it for information and research, and the questions raised on this and other blogs. But just as links on this and other blogs take you to pay-walled information, including “pay to avoid the ads,” I think that this great and wonderful technology–funded by taxpayers–will be thoroughly exploited for profit and propaganda.
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I am certainly a tech-savvy educator. I serve as my school’s webmaster, I have podcasts of all my lessons to provide opportunities for students to review, and if absent – listen to my lessons to stay current. I’m on Twitter. These are just a few of the ways I’ve incorporated tech into my practice.
I also never, ever use any of the Google apps in my classroom.
At worst, I’m accused by those who have drunk the Google Kool-Aid of being a Luddite, at best it’s been suggested that my job would be made so much easier if I embraced the Google Classroom. Even my administrators have strongly encouraged me to get with the district effort to use the Google apps in my teaching.
No.
A few years ago my district issued institutional Gmail accounts to every employee and student, allowing us all to login to Google and use all the wonderous apps they provide. I cannot deny the utility of sharing and working on common and accessible documents. I understand it all. But I still have a problem…
My issue has been and always will be related to privacy concerns for my students. Yes, I am aware that while students are using the specific Google classroom apps their meta-data is not captured by Google. What isn’t as well known is once they use the standard Google search engine that meta-data IS captured, and that is the most commonly used Google app of all.
So the students who sign in with their school-issued G mail account are seemingly protected as long as they stay within a few apps, but lose it the moment they do a Google search.
I have my own Gmail account, but I’m an adult and can make choices to give up privacy rights. The teenagers in my classes weren’t told of the potential privacy and I’d wager their parents weren’t either.
I don’t use my school-issued account unless there is a very specific reason to. And I certainly don’t use it with my students. The current is very powerful, and I’m strong enough in my resistance to just stay in place, but I’m not really able to push back against that current and move against it.
So, I just stay in place, learning how to use the apps in case I’m ordered to use them, but quietly resisting and educating my fellow educators when I can about my privacy concerns.
Thought my little story bears on the discussion.
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Excellent model for teachers to follow, rockhound!
I have rural cousins whom I’d thought of as eccentric, purposely living “off the grid”in hillside trailers. I get the urge but it seemed
impractical. What you’re doing is a smart, modified version to protect student privacy, despite the DoEd/ congressional pressure to cave to commercial pressure. Kudos!
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To paraphrase Disraeli…there are lies, there are damnable lies…and then there’s data
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