http://www.workingforchange.com/article.cfm?ItemID=18619Treating students like cattle
A rural California school becomes the first to require students to wear tracking devices
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In rural Sutter, California, a town just north of Sacramento with a population of 2,300, a controversial new program has all of the students in the one-school district being forced to wear radio-frequency identification badges that can track the students. It's the same technology used to track cattle in feedlots, or product inventory in factories.
The badges, introduced at Brittan Elementary School in January, are defended by school administrators as making attendance-gathering easier. (You know how arduous THAT task is. It must be the hardest thing teachers do all day...) And, presumably, it can help find students who get lost on the way to the restroom -- at least, the ones without the wherewithal to ditch the badges. The badges are also supposed to "reduce vandalism and improve student safety," although it's not clear how.
Naturally, some parents -- who weren't consulted before the system was imposed -- and the ACLU are up in arms about this latest invasion of student privacy. Beyond the obvious, parents are also concerned that information encoded in the badge could fall into the wrong hands, or that the radiation from the badge might pose a health hazard to the kids.
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The motivation for this system is not entirely a mystery; it turns out that the company that makes the technology, InCom, is a local company co-founded by the parent of a former Brittan student. Some parents are suspicious of the financial arrangements between the district and the company, which hopes to market the technology nationwide.
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