National student ID plan sparks privacy concerns

By MEGAN DONOGHUE
TEACHER unions have expressed privacy concerns after failing to be consulted over the Federal Government’s plan to give every school child an identity number.

Education Minister Julia Gillard revealed students will be assigned an ID, which will allow their academic results to be tracked throughout their education.

Under the plan, parents, teachers and other “concerned parties” will have access to a database documenting the performance of students throughout their schooling, regardless of school changes or inter-state transfers.

The “unique student identifier” will be run through the controversial My School program, where individual schools are ranked on the internet in accordance with performance results.

While strict privacy provisions would in theory restrict access to the information, the ACT branch secretary of the union, Penny Gilmour, expresses doubts.

“Right now, I would not be confident myself, that the website would not be free from being hacked . . . and given the lack of protection on the Myschool website for the data itself … the main issue is preventing third parties taking the data and using it for other purposes such as the construction of league tables,” she said Ms Gillard rejected claims about privacy breaches, saying the number itself is a privacy protection.

“The reason we need a number is so as a Government, we don’t need names,” she said.

Opposition Leader Tony Abbott has voiced the concerns of civil liberties groups, who believe that the plan will depersonalise children.

“I think that children should have names, not numbers, and I’m concerned about any proposal that seems to commodify our kids,” he said.

Sacred Heart primary teacher Damien Webb, however, says that schools already issue students with identification numbers, and that the information sparking privacy concerns has always been accessible to teachers and parents.

“Currently, parents and teachers already have access to student files, so it’s nothing new,” he said. “Students receive reports and transcripts which are available to parents…although it can be quite hard for teachers to gain access to a child’s full academic history, and so in that respect the idea may have merit.”