Education Database Stokes Privacy Fears

By Greg McNevin

June 18, 2008: A new student database initiative by the Queensland State Government has kicked up a privacy storm, with parents and civil liberty activist decrying moves to compile detailed information on students into a central repository.

Dubbed “OneSchool”, the mandatory program gathers together information such as names, addresses and performance records, as well as photographs, career aspirations, off-campus activities and behaviour records of students from 1,251 state schools.

According to The Courier-Mail The program aims to profile all 480,000 public school students in Queensland, with all the information stored in a central location, and accessible by those directly involved with the student’s education.

Education Queensland says OneSchool is being gradually rolled out now as IT infrastructure is improved in some schools, and is already operational in others. It claims the system will improved the ability to track each student’s progression, allowing teachers to keep a closer eye on how they are doing.

However, like the recent Smart card debacle, the system has stoked privacy fears, as well as concerns that paedophiles could access the information – particularly considering the recent arrest of four Queensland teachers involved in an international paedophile network.

Queensland's Education Minister, Rod Welford, is adamant that the database will be secure and no information will fall into the wrong hands - despite 36,500 teachers and other school staff such as principals having access. Welford says that the system will be secure as it is on the education intranet, and not the internet at large, and because none of Education Queensland's other online databases have been compromised to date.

While on some levels a centralised system would be a valuable tool, the breadth and sensitivity of the information gives the project a worrying dark side. One only has to look at the HMRC disaster in Britain earlier this year, the case of the Rogue French trader Jerome Kerviel, or the Macquarie University email blunder in 2007 to see how simple errors can have huge consequences.

Those who do not want their child registered on the network can opt to have only paper records of the information stored. Welford claims this is less secure, however, more worrying is the fact that there is no way parents can opt out of the scheme altogether.

 Welford has declared OneSchool's rollout to be "non-negotiable", and has threatened that students who do not participate could be denied access to public education.

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