Dive Brief:

• The Oklahoma Department of Education may have violated federal and state privacy laws when it shared with districts information on students no longer enrolled in its schools.  
• The department shared with districts information such as student grades, disability status, and free and reduced-lunch status.  
• If a student is no longer enrolled in a school, then the district no longer has a right to his or her information, according to Larry Smith, deputy superintendent at Sapulpa Public Schools, who initially noticed and reported the data hiccup.  

Dive Insight:

“On the Liberty district’s A-F data, we were able to view the results of spring testing — and other demographic data such as socioeconomic status — of students from other districts,” said Liberty Public Schools Superintendent Donna Campo told Tulsa World. “We do not have a right to view this information as they are no longer in our districts, which violates FERPA rights of all those students.”

This sort of oversight (or lack thereof) and over-sharing of private information is an issue many states must deal with and avoid as more data is kept online. In March, the Florida Senate passed a bill restricting the type of student data school districts can collect and advocated for a new identification system so that school districts could stop using social security numbers.