School Survey Notification and Opt-Out Law Goes Into Effect Now!

School Survey Notification: Parents: Have you been notified of the surveys to be given to your son or daughter, through direct communication?

School survey notification and opt-out law goes into effect now as students begin the 2016-2017 school year.

As we’ve reported for three years, many of our schools are administering surveys to students with little or no parental notification. To be fair, some districts are giving some notification and MACC is grateful for those. But the point of this law is to notify parents in advance, when their child’s data is about to be taken via surveys.

The data collected from surveys have been disseminated to a plethora of third parties, including business vendors, corporations, and university research institutions. Some of these entities may further share or sell that data. Much of the data is very sensitive and private and may divulge family information, including religious beliefs, sexual affiliation, political persuasion, and other information.

We do encourage parents to become involved which your school board, not only in the process of identifying appropriate surveys, but also vetting where that survey information is going. This law is expressly written for the involvement and engagement of parents.

Minnesota Statute 121A.065 states that school districts and charter schools must develop and adopt policies on conducting student surveys and their distribution IN CONSULTATION WITH PARENTS. This is about as close to local control as one gets! Additionally, school districts and charter schools must:

Directly notify parents of these policies at the beginning of each school year
Directly notify parents after making any substantive changes
Inform parents at the beginning of the year if the district or school has identified specific or approximate dates for administering survevys
Give parents reasonable notice of planned surveys scheduled after the start of the year
Give parents direct, timely notice, by United States mail, email, or other direct form of communication, when the students are scheduled to participate in a student survey
Give parents the opportunity to review the survey and to opt their students out of participating in the survey
School districts and charter schools must not impose an academic or other
penalty upon a student who opts out of participating in a survey under paragraph (a).

Read the statute.

Minnesota Statute 121A.065

466.11 Sec. 27. [121A.065] DISTRICT SURVEYS TO COLLECT STUDENT
466.12INFORMATION; PARENT NOTICE AND OPPORTUNITY FOR OPTING OUT.
466.13(a) School districts and charter schools, in consultation with parents, must develop
466.14and adopt policies on conducting student surveys and using and distributing personal
466.15information on students collected from the surveys. School districts and charter schools
466.16must:
466.17(1) directly notify parents of these policies at the beginning of each school year and
466.18after making any substantive policy changes;
466.19(2) inform parents at the beginning of the school year if the district or school has
466.20identified specific or approximate dates for administering surveys and give parents
466.21reasonable notice of planned surveys scheduled after the start of the school year;
466.22(3) give parents direct, timely notice, by United States mail, e-mail, or other direct
466.23form of communication, when their students are scheduled to participate in a student
466.24survey; and
466.25(4) give parents the opportunity to review the survey and to opt their students out of
466.26participating in the survey.
466.27(b) School districts and charter schools must not impose an academic or other
466.28penalty upon a student who opts out of participating in a survey under paragraph (a).
466.29EFFECTIVE DATE.This section is effective for the 2016-2017 school year and
466.30later.