Keeping digital learning environments safe for student and teacher data rests in part on knowing what education technology is being accessed. With this information, districts can then more easily identify areas of potential risk and begin to take action by reviewing privacy practices of unvetted edtech tools that are in use, improving communication about approved and available edtech tools, optimizing internal workflows and processes, and more. Kate Masterson, Assistant Director for Digital Security and Privacy for Carmel Clay Schools District, knows all too well how important addressing student data privacy challenges is.
“We wanted a way to communicate, both internally and externally, with our stakeholders the tools that we felt were safe for our students based on data privacy, curricular and social-emotional goals,” Masterson said.
As Carmel Clay begins activating LearnPlatform by Instructure as part of its efforts to optimize its use of education technology, one of its top goals is to improve its student data privacy practices. To start the process, district leaders quickly recognized the need for high-level insight into what tools were being used in its district. With so many edtech tools available, it became clear that taking a complete inventory of all of the district’s tools would prove to be an overwhelming task without having a way both to sustain ongoing visibility and to store and organize the data for centralized management. Likewise, the team wanted access to third-party insights on edtech tools beyond those being used in their districts.
“I like that LearnPlatform gives us the ability to maintain an internal [edtech] library with resources for our staff as well as an external library for others – I really like the flexibility of giving our teachers what they need and the parents the resources they need.” - Kate Masterson
As Kate’s team continued to explore the data uncovered in their Inventory Dashboard, which provided visibility on the edtech tools used by district students and educators, they soon discovered that there were plenty of tools in use that did not meet district or state compliance regulations. The dashboard allowed her team to gather key insights into tools that are accessed most frequently by teachers and students while sharing and communicating the appropriate data to providers, families and other members within the organization through a shared, public library. The district’s edtech library opens the door for opportunities to create customized privacy statuses – statuses that align with districtwide needs as they work towards building better data privacy practices into their edtech processes. As her team continues to gather these high-level insights, they are building their evidence base to further inform decisions to digitally protect their students.
“I’m really excited to see the data that we’re now able to collect will influence our practices and processes. A year from now, I look forward to seeing teachers interacting with the library knowing that it’s a place to go for a specific need.” - Kate Masterson
Next steps for Carmel Clay include getting data privacy agreements with all of the providers it works with and continuing to gather actionable evidence needed for the CoSN Trusted Learning Environment (TLE) Seal program. Gathering evidence has gotten the ball rolling to ensure that the edtech tools being used are abiding by all guidelines and regulations while being able to share and communicate this data with other stakeholders.
Remember, knowing what you have and in what contexts is only the first step in an iterative process that continues to build upon itself.
Get started on the path to more effective edtech here.
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