TECHNOLOGY Chromebooks In the Classroom

Dear Superintendent Starr,

November 12, 2014

After my messages with you and your assistants went unanswered over the past month, I am writing this letter in hope that you
contact me to set up a Technology Town Hall meeting to answer many questions some of your parents are asking and your staff
has yet to answer.
As a parent of a 3rd grader in Montgomery County, I too was excited to see computers being rolled out to my child. It would allow
children to engage online while opening up the opportunity to advancing on an e-learning platform.
With a goal to understand and support the effort, I asked some questions to the County official (Kara Trenkamp)l in charge of the
roll-out. Specifically, what privacy protection is in place, what pre-launch plan was implemented, and what does success to this
initiative look like?
It is at that time I began to get the run around and consequently, asked for an in person meeting at our school (PBES) with your
Chief Technology Officer (CTO), Sherwin Collette.
Approximately 50 parents showed up and we asked questions on the roll out. Unfortunately, most of the questions went
unanswered and promised material was never sent to the parents. Upon personal observation while visiting my sons classroom
and/or reviewing my sons Google Apps for Education account, I witnessed:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.

Ads from Google and Kahn Academy in my sons Gmail account,

Ads from Google in the Teachers account being shown to all students on the Prometheon board in the classroom,
Links to Google Shopping and Google Wallet freely accessible by my son with his name prefilled in the app,
Camera easily accessible by students, and
Access to an adult Google Dictionary (that had sexual intercourse as a definition for Congress) and YouTube with
access to Pornography, to name just a few.

After requesting, via FOIA, the County and Google contracts and agreements, I have concluded that Google is allowed, 100%, to
collect any and all data (data mining) on my child (and yours). You may ask ,Why does this matter?
Double Dipping: Behavioral data mining collected by Google is very valuable to their sales force. Google is also benefiting from
the sale of their educational technology software to our kids, with sales in 2013 reaching nearly $8 Billion, according to the
Software and Information Industry Association. Lastly, this is a primary reason for Google spending millions on lobbying against
any bill that would prohibit collecting child data.
For the parents reading this letter, imagine this: Googles data mined your childs online behavior for 12 years (k-12 grades) and
now your child is applying for colleges. Google sells all of your childs 12 years of behavior to the college, so they can determine
if your child is worth accepting. Furthermore, once your child has graduated and is seeking a job, his/her potential employers
purchase Googles data mined on your child to determine if they should be hired. Lastly, they finally have enough money to buy a
house and car and Google sells the bank and auto insurance company the Google data mined on your child. The bank and auto
insurance company will utilize this past behavior data to determine the risk of lending, interest rate to access, and auto premiums.
THIS IS WHY GOOGLE IS COLLECTING YOUR CHILDS DATA!
It is my goal to protect my sons electronic footprint and private data until he is old enough to make wiser decisions, it is my goal
to use his school time wisely, and it is my desire to provide the teachers with the proper training needed to determine measureable
success goals. After-all, according to Collette, [data mining] is the bogeyman of the moment,"
I am hoping you may have the same goals and provide us an opportunity to get some clear answers on this matter and get that
bogeyman out of our classroom.
Sincerely,
Ellen M. Zavian, Parent

Additional Supportive Information

Parents in other states have already taken back their childs privacy rights (i.e.: Colorado, California, Florida, Kansas, Louisiana,
RI, Maine, Virginia and more). Parents in Silver Spring, Takoma Park, Potomac, and Howard County have already reached out
and expressed their concerns me.. Some parents have asked MCPS to answer these three questions:
1.
2.
3.

What privacy protections has MCPS implemented for our students?

What does success look like with the roll out of the technology and new curriculum?
How will MCPS prepare the schools, teachers, and students to utilize the technology correctly?

Based on the FOIA documents (contracts, printed policies, and agreements) and public information, here are the answers:
Privacy 1. Few protections are in place for MCPS students and their families.
a.
b.
c.
d.
e.
f.
g.

h.
i.
j.
k.

l.
m.

Googles education platform privacy policy for students is the same privacy policy used in its consumer
services and it can be changed at anytime, by Google, without notice.
Google has already been caught misleading parents about scanning student emails for advertising purposes.
Google refuses to state whether it is scanning student emails to create user profiles for commercial purposes.
Google refuses to sign a weak industry backed student privacy pledge that would hold them accountable to
protect student privacy.
Google has been fined tens of millions of dollars for intentionally violating user privacy multiple times.
Google is mining all types of data on your child: words in emails, websites visited, videos viewed, etc and
this behavior may then be sold to advertisers and/or used for other commercial purposes.
Google is not purging any of this collected data and may sell it in the future (i.e. to insurance companies,
banks, college admission boards, potential employers), to help third parties make decisions based on 13
+years of data collected (K 12 grades) that may discriminate against students and families.
Google is placing products and services under the Shopping button that are geared towards your childs
behavior. Your child has full access to Google Shopping and Googles Wallet.
Googles word dictionary is used by your child. It is an adult dictionary (including sexual intercourse, etc),
not age appropriate.
Google has connected YouTube to our students school accounts and based on my search of sex, drugs, etc
our children are being exposed to inappropriate content.
Although we were told only persons with MCPS email extensions can email your child (ie: high school
students can freely email grammar school students), Google and Kahn Academy are both emailing your child
regularly.
The Chromebook has a camera, which allows Google to use facial recognition software on any photos stored
on Chromebook/sent via email, which is valuable to potential advertisers/customers.
Googles advertisements appear on the teachers screen regularly, which is projected on the front board of the
classroom (Promethean board) for your child to see daily.

Success 2. No quantitative data has been provided by MCPS on what success/goals looks like.
a. MCPS Chief Technology Officer, Sherwin Collette and Dr. Kara Trenkamp, Director/Dpt. Of Instructional
Technology stated that no quantitative goals have been put in place [quantitative examples: 5% increase in
reading, 3% in math scores over a 3 year period].
b. No goals to reach, then no vision, plan, strategic planning. And, thus, MCPS cannot determine failure.
c. No studies were conducted on the best age/grade to rollout the technology.
Prepare 3. Lack of preparation is evident.
a.
b.
c.
d.

Typing lessons were not taught to students prior to rollout of technology.

Lack of parent meetings by MCPS, prior to technology rollout.
Lack of strategic plan details shared with parents.
No budget numbers on training has been provided, even though requested.

THANKS TO PARENTS
STATE AND FEDERAL LAWMAKERS HAVE STARTED TO ACT TO PROTECT OUR CHILDREN
1.

State of Marylands efforts to pass a Child Data Protection Act in 2014

a. Maryland Senator Keiser, while serving as Chair of the Educational Subcommittee, sponsored
the 2014 bill, entitled Education Student Data Privacy Act 2014. (recording of hearing).
b. Google lobbied strongly against this Bill. Ultimately it did not have enough votes to pass.

2. State of California enacted the Student Online Personal Information Protection Act in 2014, restricting the
collection, storage and usage of child data by technology software companies. According to the NY Times:
.Technology companies are collecting a vast amount of data about students, touching every corner of
their educational lives with few controls on how those details are used.
Now California is poised to become the first state to comprehensively restrict how such information is
exploited by the growing education technology industry.
Legislators in the state passed a law last month prohibiting educational sites, apps and cloud services used
by schools from selling or disclosing personal information about students from kindergarten through high
school; from using the childrens data to market to them; and from compiling dossiers on them. The law is
a response to growing parental concern that sensitive information about children like data about learning
disabilities, disciplinary problems or family trauma might be disseminated and disclosed, potentially
hampering college or career prospects. Although other states have enacted limited restrictions on such data,
Californias law is the most wide-ranging.

New York Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/15/technology/with-tech-taking-over-inschools-worries-rise.html?_r=0

USA Today: http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/07/30/new-york-parents-bill-ofrights/13386741/

3. State of Colorado efforts to pass a Child Data Protection Policy in 2014

a. January, 2014, Colorados Department of Education passed the Information Security and
Privacy Data Policy to further protect students from data mining by technology software
companies.
b. In June, 2014, Colorado Governor signed the House Bill 14-1294, to further protect the
children of Colorado in K-12 grades:
.The privacy of our children is critically important, especially in
regard to their K-12 educational experience and the student data collected
during this time. Schools are a safe environment, and an important component of maintaining
security is ensuring student privacy and
protecting student data.
4. Existing federal and state privacy laws such as FERPA and COPPA have not kept up with technology and do
not adequately protect K-12 students. Experts from around the country have stated our students need stronger
privacy protections:
http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/marketplacek12/2014/04/google_abandons_scanning_of_student_email_acco
unts.html
http://college.usatoday.com/2014/01/11/will-more-schools-make-privacy-a-priority-in-2014/