Giving Compass' Take:

• Tech companies have access to troves of student data without restriction for use. This information puts vulnerable young people at risk for exploitation. 

• How can laws be structured to protect students? Why has this issue largely been left out of the privacy conversation? 

• Read an education perspective on Mark Zuckerberg’s Senate testimony.

With little public oversight, Google has infiltrated schools. While congressional representatives expressed outrage at Facebook’s intrusive data grabs during Capitol Hill hearings with Mark Zuckerberg, not a peep was heard about the Silicon Valley–Beltway theft ring purloining the personal information and browsing habits of millions of American schoolchildren.

It doesn’t take undercover investigative journalists to unmask the massive privacy invasion enabled by educational technology and federal mandates. The kiddie data heist is happening out in the open — with Washington politicians and bureaucrats as brazen co-conspirators.

Facebook is just one of the tech giants partnering with the U.S. Department of Education and schools nationwide in pursuit of student data for meddling and profit. Google, Apple, Microsoft, Pearson, Knewton, and many more are cashing in on the Big Data boondoggle.

The recently passed Every Student Succeeds Act further enshrined government collection of personally identifiable information — including data collected on attitudes, values, beliefs, and dispositions — and allows release of the data to third-party contractors thanks to Obama-era loopholes carved into the Family Education Rights and Privacy Act.

And the so-called school-to-work pipeline creates endless avenues into taxpayer coffers for firms pitching data-gathering initiatives to “align” student learning with “skill sets” and “competencies” desired by corporations.

Read the full article about the student data-mining scandel by Michelle Malkin at National Review.