Confidentiality in the Classroom
RD
Grand Canyon University: EDU 536
December 21, 2011

U.S. Education – Current and Future Trends Confidentiality is a hot topic – in the classroom, in business and in everyday life. Guarding personal information prior to the onslaught of identity theft was important but not to the extent that it is today. In today’s classroom protecting confidential information is a 3-fold process – protecting the student’s records, protecting personally identifiable information from the student’s record and allowing parent’s access to their child’s information. There are federal and state laws that govern confidentiality and how schools can and cannot utilize that information as outlined under the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA). FERPA, a federal law, applies to educational agencies or institutions that receive federal funds and protects the privacy of student educational records and assures parents the right to access those records. FERPA also allows authorized educational personnel the right to access and review student records without prior parental consent and in situations where conduct “poses a significant risk to the safety or well-being of a student, other students, or other members of the school community” allows the district to release information from a discipline record without consent to employees who have a legitimate educational interest in a student’s behavior. In Confidentiality issues: parental rights each state’s board of education outlines how they will handle sensitive and confidential information regarding students, student’s personal information and student’s educational materials. Such information such as directory information, closed school board meetings when disclosing personally identifiable information regarding students under the age of 18, test security and state test scores may only be released as outlined under FERPA. Areas such as peer grading may have parents questioning whether a FERPA violation has occurred but as decided in Falvo v. Owasso ISD, peer grading was determined to be a learning experience for all students and did not violate FERPA. Parents can be allowed to access their child’s various records such as attendance, test, grades, health and evaluations as well as review teaching materials including textbooks and aids and review the tests their child takes after it has been administered to the child’s class. Parents must give written consent before a school employee can administer a psychological exam, test or treatment (except in the investigation of child abuse) or when a video and/or audiotape will be made unless it is for specific purpose not requiring parental consent as outlined by the Texas Educational Code. Parents may also remove their children temporarily from class or an activity for religious or moral beliefs. In the article Confidentiality and Ethics these two areas are outlined as they pertain to the child development program at California State University. Student interns working with or observing children in the classroom or viewing from the observation rooms follow the principles drawn from the National Associations for the Education of Young Children’s Code of Ethics. While working with the young children and their families they follow certain guidelines such as no discussions about the behavior or appearance of the children or staff that they are working with. They also treat the time in the observation room as a privilege and when they hear students saying something that they find funny, alarming or confusing they need to remember that they do not have the context or information regarding prior activities that may have caused the comment. Above all the student interns must keep confidential their assignment or observations and not repeat the things they see outside the observation room or to friends or family. When these student interns follow the code of ethics and maintain the confidentiality of the child development program they avoid situations that could damage the trust the school has with the staff and the families. In the article Ethical Principles for College and University Teaching the Canadian Society for Teaching and Learning in Higher Education (STLHE) distributed a document that was drafted and endorsed by a select group of exemplary teachers. The document has 9 Principles that were discussed in length and Principle 6 covered confidentiality in regards to student grades, attendance records and private communications. Principle 6 suggests that students will be afforded the same level of confidentiality in their relationship with their teachers, as they would receive in the lawyer-client or doctor-patient relationship. The Principle also discussed that without adequate “grounds” (i.e., student consent, legitimate purpose or benefit to student) confidentiality would be violated if student academic records were discussed with other facility members or outside individuals such as potential employers or by leaving a pile of graded tests outside a classroom for anyone to thumb through. Principle 6 suggested that having students pick up their graded tests individually and not discussing student information with outside individuals would be the key to maintaining confidentiality and the student-teacher trust factor. Pete and Pam Wright discussed a different area concerning confidentiality in the paper Parent Observations v. Student Confidentiality. In this article the topic of parental observations at a potential school for a learning disabled student was discussed. When the parents asked the school administrator if they could view a potential placement for their child they were informed that since they would be seeing current students in the class this would violate those children’s confidentiality and therefore they could not view the classroom. This attitude from the school administrator sends the wrong message to potential parents and indicates that the school is hiding something from the parents and that the program may not be appropriate for their child. By not allowing parents to view where their children will be in school, the types of activities they will be involved in and seeing the various teachers interacting with current students violates the rights of the parents and sends the wrong message home. The way confidentiality is being used at this particular school is not the correct use of confidentiality in regards to students. If this school receives Title 1 funding they have an obligation to work with parents to develop a parental involvement policy and hold yearly meetings with the parents to discuss this policy and inform them of their rights to be involved in the child’s education. This article showed the incorrect use of confidentiality in the classroom. Overall, confidentiality is a very important aspect for the school, the teachers, the administrators and the school district. Protecting student information is a top priority for every school and school district and when violations occur it is probably due to a misunderstanding of what constitutes confidentiality as shown in the article Parent Observation v. Student Confidentiality. Not following the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) breaks down the trust factors between the student, the family and the teachers and could have the potential for a lawsuit and a violation of a federal law. When there are questions regarding what information needs to be kept confidential the question should be taken to the school board for clarification to ensure there is no confusion.

References
Murray, H., Gillese, E., Lennon, M., Mercer, P., & Robinson, M. (1996). Ethical principles for college and university teaching. AAHE Bulletin, Retrieved from http://www.aahea.org/bulletins/articles/Ethical Principles.htm
Wright, P., & Wright, P. (2006, March 13). Parent observations v. student confidentiality. Retrieved from http://www.wrightslaw.com/info/priv.confid.observe.htm
Confidentiality and ethics. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.csuchico.edu/chld/lab/program/confidentialityEthics.shtml
Confidentiality issues;parental rights. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.tcta.org/publications/tctas_survival_guide/confidentiality_issues_parental_rights