Last week, I published a Q & A with Dr. Jeffrey Korostoff on the Release of Annual Professional Performance Review for New Rochelle Teachers and Principals based on his announcement about the availability of APPR data late last month.
The entire construct of the Q&A is based on a misleading construct of some questions and statements with false or misleading answers mostly revolving around the desire of stakeholders — the administration, the school board and the union — to convince parents and the public that all APPR data is “confidential” and that there will be some sort of negative consequences if a parent shares the APPR data they are entitled to receive under the law.
All of this is completely and utterly false. The law is silent on what a parent does with the APPR data for their child’s teachers and principal.
You would not know that from the listening to school officials.
In the Q&A, parents are told “we strongly request that individual families take sensible steps to insure that what is intended to be confidential information does not become public (emphasis added).
Under New York State Law, public records are not “viewed” as confidential. They are either confidential by statute or they are not confidential. So, again, where in the law does it says that the APPR data is “confidential”? It does not as the language in the law makes clear.
Here is the entire section of New York Education Law §3012-c(10)(b), the law that pertains to parents:
- Each school district and board of cooperative educational services shall fully disclose and release to the parents and legal guardians of a student the final quality rating and composite effectiveness score for each of the teachers and for the principal of the school building to which the student is assigned for the current school year upon the request of such parents and legal guardians.
- The governing body of each school district and board of cooperative educational services shall provide conspicuous notice to parents and legal guardians of the right to obtain such information.
- Parents and legal guardians may review and receive such data in any manner, including by phone or in person; shall receive an oral or written explanation of the composite effectiveness scoring ranges for final quality ratings; and be offered opportunities to understand such scores in the context of teacher evaluation and student performance.
- Reasonable efforts shall be made to verify that and such request is a bona fide request by a parent or guardian entitled to review and receive such data pursuant to this paragraph.
In plain English, this paragraph says that the Board of Education must provide conspicuous notice to Parents/Guardians of their right to obtain the APPR Data for each of their child’s teachers and for that child’s school principal,, make “reasonable efforts” to verify that that the Parents/Guardian is entitled to the APPR Data, provide the APPR Data in any manner — phone, in person, written — chosen by the Parents/Guardian
Nowhere in the law does is any mention that the APPR data obtained by the parents is “confidential” or may not be shared or made public.
The obvious way to distribute the APPR Data would be to upload a PDF file to each Home Access account on the District web site. The District claims it cannot do this because APPR data cannot be published to the web. This is false. The District also claims that since APPR data can only be given to Parents/Guardians whose identity they have made “reasonable efforts” to verify, Home Access is not an option. Any parent who had to jump through hoops to prove they were entitled to obtain the password for their child’s Home Access account knows that the steps to verify the identity of a Parents/Guardian for a Home Access login are just as rigorous if not more so than the steps being taken to release APPR Data. The District also claims that uploading APPR Data to Home Access is prohibited under the law because the law says that a parent must request the APPR Data. This is false, the law only says that IF a Parents/Guardian makes a request the APPR Data must be provided; it says nothing about the District being proactive in providing the APPR Data.
In fact last year the District printed all the APPR data for every parent before any requests were made by Parents/Guardians. The vast majority of the APPR Data reports were thrown away because few parents requested them — not surprising since the District did nothing to advertise their availability in a meaningful, promotional way. What the District has done is the bare minimum it thinks it can do and still comply with the law.
The District bandies about the term “confidential”.
The word “confidential” has a specific legal meaning. It is not a “view” that the District has or something to be hoped is respected. If some public information or record is “confidential” then it is so BY STATUTE. Something is confidential when an applicable law says so — and this law does not say that. If this information were confidential then parents would not be able to obtain the information at all. Something is either confidential or not, not somewhat confidential or confidential except for certain members of the public.
There are restrictions on the distribution of personally identifiable by the State and by the District but the law requires making certain APPR data available to parents/guardians and then is silent on what parents do with the data they obtain. Nowhere in the law is there anything about the APPR data available to parents being “confidential”.
So, where in the law does it says that the APPR data should not become public? It does not. Where in the law does it say that APPR data cannot be published to the web? It does not.
This being the case, why does the City School District of New Rochelle required Parents/Guardians to certify that they understand that APPR Data is “confidential” and requested “for my own personal interest”?
PARENT/LEGAL GUARDIAN DISCLOSURE OF EVALUATION SCORES REQUEST FORM
“I certify that I am requesting this information for my own personal interest and understand that the information is confidential”.
Simple, the educational establishment wants to convince Parents/Guardians and the public at large that it is illegal to obtain APPR Data and make that data public.
This battle has already been fought in the Los Angles School District.