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Data Privacy
Student Online Personal Protection Act (SOPPA)
Effective July 1, 2021, school districts will be required by the Student Online Personal Protection Act (SOPPA) to provide additional guarantees that student data is protected when collected by educational technology companies, and that data is used for beneficial purposes only (105 ILCS 85).
Below is a high-level overview of the new requirements. Please refer to the legislation for specific timelines and components of each element. School districts must:
- Annually post a list of all operators of online services or applications utilized by the district.
- Annually post all data elements that the school collects, maintains, or discloses to any entity. This information must also explain how the school uses the data, and to whom and why it discloses the data.
- Post contracts for each operator within 10 days of signing.
- Annually post subcontractors for each operator.
- Post the process for how parents can exercise their rights to inspect, review and correct information maintained by the school, operator, or ISBE.
- Post data breaches within 10 days and notify parents within 30 days.
- Create a policy for who can sign contracts with operators.
- Designate a privacy officer to ensure compliance.
- Maintain reasonable security procedures and practices. Agreements with vendors in which information is shared must include a provision that the vendor maintains reasonable security procedures and practices.
Follow the SOPPA link to the left for a list of all of the approved online resources currently available in District 41.
Parents can request to review and correct any information maintained by the District or any online/application provider by contacting helpdesk@d41.org.
Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA)
FERPA is a Federal law that protects the privacy of student education records. It gives parents certain rights with respect to their children's education records. These rights transfer to the student when he or she reaches the age of 18 or attends a school beyond the high school level. Students to whom the rights have transferred are "eligible students."
Children's Online Privacy and Protection Act (COPPA)
COPPA, is a law dealing with how websites, apps, and other online operators collect data and personal information from kids under the age of 13. COPPA has a number of requirements, but some key ones are that tech companies making apps, websites, and online tools for kids under 13 must:
- provide notice and get parental consent before collecting information from kids;
- have a "clear and comprehensive" privacy policy;
- and keep information they collect from kids confidential and secure.
Children’s Internet Protection Act (CIPA)
CIPA was enacted by Congress in 2000 to address concerns about children’s access to obscene or harmful content over the Internet. CIPA imposes certain requirements on schools or libraries that receive discounts for Internet access or internal connections through the E-rate program.
Protection of Pupil Rights Amendment (PPRA)
PPRA is intended to protect the rights of parents and students in two ways:
- It seeks to ensure that schools and contractors make instructional materials available for inspection by parents if those materials will be used in connection with an ED-funded survey, analysis, or evaluation in which their children participate; and
- It seeks to ensure that schools and contractors obtain written parental consent before minor students are required to participate in any ED-funded survey, analysis, or evaluation that reveals certain information.
PPRA applies to programs that receive funding from the U.S. Department of Education.
Student Expectations and Directions
- We expect all students to be respectful, responsible and safe online and to understand that the district Acceptable Use Policy (Student friendly version) still pertains to them when they are at home.
- We encourage parents to have conversations with their child/children about their digital citizenship. This is an exciting time for our students to learn new communication skills in an authentic way! It remains important to remember to continuously monitor their usage of and interactions through technology.
Process for Approval of Online Applications and Services
District 41 has a process for selecting online applications and services used for instructional purposes by staff and students. Teachers must fill out a form and request access to any website or online service for student use. The Digital Literacy Specialists at each school and the Technology Department review the requests for these resources on an individual basis. The Digital Literacy Specialists review the resource for educational merit and alignment with the District’s curriculum. The Technology Department inspects the resource for security and compatibility with District technology. After this review process, the online resource may be made available unless concerns around these criteria are found.Other district-wide online resources are selected at the Cabinet level based on a need to support our curriculum or to collect assessment data. Examples of these resources are MAP, for local assessment of all students, Big Ideas for the math curriculum at Hadley and Eureka for math curriculum at our elementary schools.
Follow the SOPPA link to the left for a list of all of the approved online resources currently available in District 41.
Data Incidents
District 41 will post details here about incidents involving 10% or more of the District's students, including the number of students whose covered informaiton was involved in an incident, date of incident (or estimate) and the operator name.
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