Good news! Due to growing opposition, inBloom, a data tracking and management company will close down
April 30, 2014
The data tech company inBloom was started with seed money from the Gates Foundation. The company’s plan was to collect student data from various sources, store them in the “cloud” and allow the data to be accessed for various educational purposes. Faced with parent concerns and with recent data protection legislation from the New York legislature, inBloom has announced they will close down. Read the NY Times story.
InBloom’s CEO Iwan Streichenberger explained that the data would be secure at all times. “At the end of the day, the data is controlled by districts and states…. We just want to make it easier for vendors to be engaged with districts in a secure environment,” he said in an Education Week interview.
We are not reassured by CEO Streichenberger’s words. We really don’t want to “make it easier for vendors” to access “data controlled by districts and states,” especially since the FERPA laws have been loosened by the Federal Department of Education to allow states and districts to share data more easily, even across state or international boundaries.
We can enjoy a quick celebration; however, there are many other data management companies out there, and the Gates Foundation has quite a bit more money. We parents and citizens who believe in data privacy must continue to be vigilant.
Tags: Common Core State Standards, data, federal, tracking
The data tech company inBloom was started with seed money from the Gates Foundation. The company’s plan was to collect student data from various sources, store them in the “cloud” and allow the data to be accessed for various educational purposes. Faced with parent concerns and with recent data protection legislation from the New York legislature, inBloom has announced they will close down. Read the NY Times story.
InBloom’s CEO Iwan Streichenberger explained that the data would be secure at all times. “At the end of the day, the data is controlled by districts and states…. We just want to make it easier for vendors to be engaged with districts in a secure environment,” he said in an Education Week interview.
We are not reassured by CEO Streichenberger’s words. We really don’t want to “make it easier for vendors” to access “data controlled by districts and states,” especially since the FERPA laws have been loosened by the Federal Department of Education to allow states and districts to share data more easily, even across state or international boundaries.
We can enjoy a quick celebration; however, there are many other data management companies out there, and the Gates Foundation has quite a bit more money. We parents and citizens who believe in data privacy must continue to be vigilant.
Tags: Common Core State Standards, data, federal, tracking