School data collection firm to close doors

Bill San Antonio

The data collection service inBloom, which has drawn criticism from parents and education officials throughout the state for a lack of clarity on how its information would be used, has announced it will be closing its doors in the next few months.

In a letter posted to the Atlanta-based technology nonprofit’s website, Chief Executive Officer Iwan Streichenberger wrote InBloom has been “the subject of mischaracterizations and a lightning rod for misdirected criticism” that recently culminated in the state Legislature enacting a budget provision that barred the education department from contracting data collection to outside companies. 

“Therefore, in full alignment with the inBloom board of directors and funders, I have made the decision to wind down the organization over the coming months,” he wrote. “It wasn’t an easy decision, and the unavailability is a real missed opportunity for teachers and school districts seeking to improve student learning.”

InBloom was created in 2011 by a collection of educators, state officials and non-profit foundations to, as Streichenberger wrote Monday, “create a resource that allows teachers to get a more complete picture of student progress so they can individualize instruction while saving time, effort and precious resources.” It was funded with a $100 million grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

In the years since Streichenberger joined inBloom in 2012, the non-profit has come under fire by school districts and education departments throughout the country, with all nine of its charter states halting or pulling third-party student data collection programs from their annual budgets. 

“I thought it was badly handled from the beginning,” said Herricks Superintendent of Schools John Bierwirth, who co-chairs a subcommittee on testing for the New York State Council of School Superintendents. 

“No one ever came up with a rationale that you could explain to me or anybody else that made [inBloom] seem worthwhile,” he said. “It wasn’t just a question of cost or the huge issues about confidentiality, there was that threshold question of why are we even doing this in the first place? I don’t think they ever answered anybody’s concern, whether it was from parents, teachers, school board members or school superintendents.”

In New York, the state education department regularly collects student data from school districts – including report cards, transcripts, course schedules, school lunch and transportation information – to meet state and federal regulations.

New York had partnered with inBloom as part of its Education Data Portal initiative, funded by a $700 million federal Race to the Top education grant, giving school districts access to dashboards of information about their students to assess their needs and add programs outside of those provided by the state.

But in the recently adopted state budget, the Legislature included a stipulation to “halt its relationship with inBloom and consider alternative paths to accomplish the goals of increased data transparency and analytics.”

“It is a shame that the progress of this important innovation has been stalled because of generalized public concerns about data misuse, even though inBloom has world-class security and privacy protections that have raised the bar for school districts and the industry as a whole,” Streichenberger wrote.

Roger Tilles, a Great Neck resident and Long Island’s representative on the state Board of Regents, said inBloom distracted New Yorkers and the state education department from a more significant issue – the implementation of the Common Core testing standards.

“The big picture was one I support and have been trying to promote, but some of these little irritants like inBloom were causing a furor about them where there didn’t need to be one,” he said.

State lawmakers on Tuesday regarded the dissolution of inBloom as a victory for New York and its students.

“Working together, we protected our children’s privacy and pulled New York out of its relationship with inBloom,” state Sen. Jack Martins (R-Mineola) said in a statement. “Good riddance.”

State Assemblyman Ed Ra (R-Franklin Square) said that while he is pleased with the end of the state’s relationship with inBloom, there are still issues with New York’s data collection practices that must still be addressed. 

“The budget provisions, really, by and large, to me in my reading are more about transparency than anything else, which is obviously a good thing and a step forward in making sure parents are aware of how and where their data is being utilized” he said. “But I do think there needs to be more independence from the state education department going forward in that regard.”

Ra said the state would have benefited from a law that passed in the Assembly last year that would allow parents to opt out of sharing children’s data.

“I don’t think it’s the end of the data privacy issue,” Ra said. “Some are presenting it that way and I think it’s a little premature.”

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