Privacy in School?

Bio-Tracking Students

A present from the Gates family.  You just have to love those people.  They have no kids of their own, but they don't adopt puppies or go on Auntie overdrive like normal people.  Nope.  They're billionaires, so they are spending cash on public schools.  Schools say thanks and then do whatever the Gates family wants.

What they want is to make sure little Johnny knows how to read is biometrically "engaged" in class.   So they're funding bracelets to track the kids' attention and collecting data about everyyything.  Diane Ravitch blogged about how teachers would ensure kids are really, really "engaged" in their class if it meant funding for them:

"One suggested she would pick students at random and scream at them; everyone in the class would have a faster heartbeat, not knowing who would be humiliated next... there were suggestions of soft porn..."

Okayy.  I think we can all agree there are some things that should not be tracked.  Ew.

Teacher Privacy?

Teachers should have the right to say anything at any time and in front of anybody and they shouldn't be eavesdropped on or recorded in class.  Even if a parent has a strong suspicion that bullying is going on in which the teachers are involved.  And even if these special-needs students would be unable to formulate a complaint on their own.  Arrggh.

A young child was humiliated constantly, has trouble going to school.  Mom records what's going on secretly and the teachers are upset because they expected the conversations they had about how they hate the kids/parents and humiliating details about certain children - in front of the kids! - to be private.  I mean, it should be a private thing if you were to discuss a buxom mom who is hard to get along with, and if you were to make racist little jokes about her Puerto Rican heritage in front of her kid, right?  Private.

But the mom violated state law apparently.  You just watch her get sued for trying to protect her kid.

I don't see why cameras wouldn't be mandatory in all special-ed classrooms just as they are on school buses here.  I wish this mommy and her kiddo all the best.

By the way, I had no idea until I read the comments in this article that misbehaviour and/or teacher bullying in school was caused by condoms, President Obama, and the fact that old people don't pay much in taxes in Florida.  Who knew?