Hamden parent concerned about student privacy as shared photos showed up on iPad

April 16-- Apr. 16--HAMDEN -- The parent of an elementary school student is concerned students' privacy is being violated by the school district after she found photos of students from across the district on her child's school-provided iPad.

The district has since wiped the device, provided a new iPad to the student and initiated training for a staff member who had shared the photos across multiple devices.

The student was given the device as part of an educational placement and was set up with an administrator's login, which is standard as the district works to provide students with their own devices, school officials said.

The student's mother, who asked her name not be used to protect her family's privacy, said more than 300 photos were on the device when her child was given it in late December.

"It was disheartening, because it's pictures of kids in their educational placements and it's a major breach in confidentiality," she said.

School officials, however, said FERPA laws -- which protect student privacy -- weren't violated because educational records were not shared and none of the parents of students pictured on the iPad had opted out of their children being photographed in the schools.

Photos of students districtwide were grouped into folders according to which school they attended, the mother said. They included students at Bear Path, Alice Peck, Spring Glen and Church Street schools, she said.

"Hamden Public Schools takes very seriously the issue of student data privacy," Director of Program, Technology and Communications Karen Kaplan said. "We have made every effort to comply with state and federal laws related to privacy and keep our students' data private and secure. That being said, sometimes we are not perfect."

A photograph of a minimally verbal student, whose mother said he doesn't use assistive technology, appears to show the student sitting on the lap of a male school employee. Another photo shows a student being poked in the face by an unseen person.

Kaplan said she didn't handle the specific device or look at the photos, and nobody involved in wiping the devices raised any concern over the content. It's unknown whether any school employees looked through the photos on the devices.

Kaplan said in special education environments, physical contact can sometimes be what children need to manage behaviors, and holding a child could be normal in that situation. Without having seen the photos, Kaplan said she couldn't know whether the actions were inappropriate.

Superintendent of Schools Jody Goeler said he hasn't been told of any investigation into photos found on the devices and the principal at the school attended by the child who was photographed sitting on someone's lap said nobody has brought forward any complaints he is aware of about the content of the photos.

On the overall iPad sharing issue, Kaplan said she recently was made aware of the practice by one staff member who violated the district's norms and processes for ensuring student data privacy.

"This staff member had no ill-intent, and was familiar with the privacy laws," Kaplan said. "However, she did not understand the technology device being used well enough to realize that her method of providing individual student access to the device could also allow other students access to stored data."

The staff member involved was given additional training on the devices so the incident won't happen again, Kaplan said. There were fewer than 12 devices linked with the administrator's account and some had photo sharing turned on while others did not, Kaplan said.

The mother of the child who received the device said some of the students whose images were on the iPad were identifiable to her because they live in her neighborhood, and others her daughter recognized from school.

The mother who found the photos tried turning off the photo sharing but didn't have device permission, she said. She brought the photos to the attention of the elementary school principal, but said nothing was done by the district since the photos of students were still on the device two months later.

The principal at that school declined to comment on why the process took so long.

The mother said she later learned that the administrator whose ID was linked with the iPad had called a special education teacher in her child's school to wipe the device without telling the mother. This was allegedly done as a favor to the device administrator, and upper administration wasn't contacted about it, according to the mother.

The elementary school principal and the mother didn't know anyone working for the district had attempted to wipe the device since pictures of students, families and staff were still there in early February, she said.

"There was no real attempt to make it right," she said.

Goeler said the first time he learned about the photo sharing was when the parent met with him and Assistant Superintendent Chris Mellilo in March. At the time, photos of students and staff were still on the device.

Kaplan said when she and Goeler learned about the photos, the sharing ability was turned off immediately. Collecting the device and wiping the photos took time because the district didn't haven another device immediately available to swap out with the student. Near the end of March, the mother brought the iPad in and the administration gave her a new device for her child with a unique login.

Goeler said there are times when photo sharing is appropriate and it's used for educational purposes, such as when students use Google Docs collaboratively, which can include photo sharing. But the district works to balance that with managing privacy, he said.

"There's a lot of attention to privacy, so this is a conversation all schools are having with their boards," Goeler said. "We understand the need for privacy and want to be sensitive to that, but we want students to learn and have students take advantage of these devices and what's available.

"There are a lot of issues we're trying to sort through so we can allow students full access to technology and be mindful of the students' rights as well. It's a constant source of tension."

mdignan@hearstmediact.com

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