Privacy and student records

Teachers get asked these questions by parents, usually at the worst moment. This chapter is so you can answer without going to look for somebody.

The binding versions are the School Data Privacy and FERPA Addendum, the Privacy Policy and the Children's Privacy Notice. This chapter is a plain summary and does not replace them.

The short answer for a parent

That is worth learning as a sentence, because it is the question parents actually ask and the answer surprises them.

What is collected about a student

• First name, and last name if the school provided one
• Grade and age, if the school provided them
• The login code
• Which letters, words and sentences were practiced
• The three measurements from each attempt, and the resulting score
• The date and time of each attempt
• Any notes a teacher writes

What is never collected

• No image, recording or reconstruction of the handwriting. The strokes are measured on the device and only the measurements leave it.
• No date of birth. Age and grade are collected, a birth date is not.
• No email address or password for a student. School students have neither.
• No advertising of any kind to children, and no use of a child's information for targeted advertising.
• No biometric profile. The handwriting is not used to identify or authenticate the child.

Who can see a student's record

The last two rows are the ones that surprise people.

Parents and the school record. When a school buys the license, the school owns the record. A parent's right to see it runs through the school, the same as any other education record. If a parent asks us directly, we refer them to the school. Give them a printout from the student page and the conversation is over in a minute.

Our own staff. We do not have independent access to student work. Our provisioning screen deliberately shows seat counts and license dates and no student writing, because setting up an account is not a reason to read a child's practice. That is a contractual commitment in the FERPA addendum, not an internal policy we could quietly change.

School records against family records

A child who uses Skhillz Script at school and at home has two separate records that never meet.

• The school record belongs to the school and is visible to their teacher.
• The family record belongs to the parent and is visible only to them.

Neither can see the other. A parent cannot check up on classwork through their home account, and you cannot see home practice in your class table. Tell parents this up front and it prevents a whole category of confusion.

Notes

A note you write about a student is part of that student's education record. A parent may ask the school to see it, and that right does not depend on which visibility you chose when you wrote it. See Notes and reports.

Deletion

• A school or district administrator may request permanent deletion of student records. Once done it cannot be undone.
• Active-system data is ordinarily removed or de-identified within 90 days of a verified request.
• Encrypted backups may hold copies for up to 180 days before normal overwrite. Backups are not used for ordinary business activity, and are not searched to answer a question about a child.

We say the 180 days plainly rather than promising an instant erasure we could not honestly deliver. Any vendor telling you a deletion is instantaneous everywhere is telling you about their intentions rather than their backups.

If a parent objects to the program entirely

Take it to your administrator rather than trying to solve it in the classroom. Schools have their own processes for this, and the relevant terms are in the School Data Privacy and FERPA Addendum, which your district signed.

Questions we cannot answer for you

Whether your district's own policy allows a given use, whether a particular parent has already consented, and what your state requires. Those live with your district, not with us. What we can tell you is exactly what the product collects and who can see it, which is everything above.