Comments on: Texas student suspended for refusing RFID tracker

By: Coderjoe

Coderjoe — Tue, 27 Nov 2012 06:42:00 +0000

There are many that see the current compulsory schooling system as just that, a system that stamps out product (cogs for the consumerist machine). One interesting place to look is in the writings of John Taylor Gatto, a retired teacher of around 30 years.

By: Coderjoe

Coderjoe — Tue, 27 Nov 2012 06:04:00 +0000

”there” being NM and “here” being MI?

By: donovan acree

donovan acree — Mon, 26 Nov 2012 14:40:00 +0000

They are replacing a head count each class with technology. In other words, even though the proven method of taking attendance has been part of each class for decades or more, this school decided to spend money, it says it does not have, in order to prove attendance, it is already capable of proving, with the hope that doing so will increase their funding.
The religious nut-job is a red herring. Either the school board is incompetent and has displayed amazingly poor fiscal decision making ability or the stated reason for these RFID trackers is not the real reason they want them.

By: Callie

Callie — Sun, 25 Nov 2012 19:16:00 +0000

Criminals have done something wrong and therefore are subject to monitoring as a condition of punishment. The majority of students haven’t done anything wrong. I would be okay with “monitoring” a chronically truant student, but not kids who haven’t shown a need for this kind of thing. (Although I bet most “chronically truant” kids will lose/misplace this ID anyway and not really care.)

By: Callie

Callie — Sun, 25 Nov 2012 19:13:00 +0000

I’m sure it’s not. These things break/don’t work/don’t work correctly and it makes more work for the teachers to “fix” it instead of just doing it with pen and paper in the first place.

By: Callie

Callie — Sun, 25 Nov 2012 19:10:00 +0000

I taught for 14 years in public schools and now teach at the college level. It’s really not that difficult to take attendance with your eyes and a piece of paper, or have students sign in, or even turn in an assignment a piece of paper with their signature on it each day. The closest I’ve ever come to anything like this was with a large musical ensemble of 250+ people (marching band); we did ID swiping for attendance, which required the student to physically come to a person and hand them their ID to be scanned (in other words, you can’t turn over a friend’s ID to be scanned so they don’t actually have to show up). But that seems different to me because it requires an action on the part of the student and not simply being passively tracked.

and yes, I knew all 250+ of those kids’ names. It’s not hard if you put in the effort. (When I taught elementary school, I had 800 students total. I knew all their names too.)

By: TNGMug

TNGMug — Sun, 25 Nov 2012 04:22:00 +0000

To my ears her religious reasoning sounds on par with any other third world Vodoo, but that’s really here nor there. The purpose for protecting privacy is really for whatever reason one chooses, religious beliefs included. The only sad part here is that one shouldn’t have to resort to appealing to a religious majority in order to be entitled to privacy in the first place.

By: Architexas

Architexas — Sat, 24 Nov 2012 22:44:00 +0000

The students are required to wear them around their necks (great fashion statement!) so that they are visible. I would imagine that a student caught not wearing their tag would receive some form of punishment.

By: Architexas

Architexas — Sat, 24 Nov 2012 20:52:00 +0000

I was raised in Dallas, and I still live in Texas. When I was in school, our teachers took attendance at the beginning of class, usually facilitated by a seating chart so they would know who was there and who wasn’t at a glance. My mom is a teacher (and a damned fine one, at that) and she takes attendance this way. In high school, our campus was rather sprawling, and it was easy for students to skip off campus between classes. HOWEVER, our teachers always took attendance at the beginning of class. I don’t see why the San Antonio school doesn’t just do the same thing, instead of investing a bunch of taxpayer money on fancy electronics that people find offensive. Paper, pen, seating chart: BAM.

I’m not religious by any stretch of the imagination, but I have been surrounded my whole life by peers who have deeply held religious beliefs. And this isn’t the first time I’ve heard of someone refusing a mandatory form of identification because they believe it could be “The Mark of the Beast.” I remember, as a sophomore in high school, having a conversation with a friend whose family – and many of their fellow church-goers – believed that the US government would require everyone to have an identity card to be carried with them all the time, and that mandatory government IDs could be “The Mark of the Beast.”

While I disagree with their theories on what the IDs “mean”, I defend their right to believe in those theories. As an atheist who has been persecuted for her religious beliefs in a “Christian”-majority state (by hypocrites who forget that whole “love thy neighbor” thing), I will defend anyone’s right to their beliefs, so long as their beliefs do not infringe on my rights.

By: Tim in SF

Tim in SF — Sat, 24 Nov 2012 19:50:00 +0000

“and the census is by definition a very coarse form of anonymized tracking”
False. In no sense is this true.

By: Tim in SF

Tim in SF — Sat, 24 Nov 2012 19:02:00 +0000

If by “nuke” you mean “microwave” then I agree.

By: Crissa

Crissa — Sat, 24 Nov 2012 17:39:00 +0000

Students have the right not to be tracked through the schools? Hall monitors are tyranny?

By: Crissa

Crissa — Sat, 24 Nov 2012 17:38:00 +0000

According to other posters, the school offered that suggestion…

By: Crissa

Crissa — Sat, 24 Nov 2012 17:37:00 +0000

But it isn’t invading their privacy where they expect privacy.

By: Crissa

Crissa — Sat, 24 Nov 2012 17:36:00 +0000

Texas’s government is Republican, so blame them.

By: Crissa

Crissa — Sat, 24 Nov 2012 17:35:00 +0000

How is that different than lunch cards or IDs?

By: Crissa

Crissa — Sat, 24 Nov 2012 17:34:00 +0000

If workers for police or a company needed special safety underwear, would you allow objectors to take those jobs and refuse the safety equipment?

That’s what’s happening here. The tag can only be tracked if it’s in the open, it can be taken on and off. She’s only being asked to wear it through certain doors.

Did she also opt out of a library card and a lunch card and a driver’s license or credit card? Does she not buy things at stores with ‘security devices’ on them? They’re not much different.

By: Antinous / Moderator

Antinous / Moderator — Sat, 24 Nov 2012 04:48:00 +0000

But they gravitated to their natural environments.

By: Charlie B

Charlie B — Sat, 24 Nov 2012 04:22:00 +0000

Word! Molly Ivins was a Texan, the Shrub is a new Englander by birth and by family.

By: ravenlunatick

ravenlunatick — Fri, 23 Nov 2012 23:09:00 +0000

In theory, they can do so. In practice they don’t check. They aren’t allowed to check unless they have a reasonable suspicion that education is not happening. Something has to be really hinkey before they can intervene.

Policy/Program Memorandum 131 (this is the MOE’s policy doc on HSing) states that the school board, “should accept the written notification of the parents each
year as evidence that the parents are providing satisfactory instruction
at home.”
I home schooled for 3 years. They don’t check.

Here’s the link: http://www.edu.gov.on.ca/extra/eng/ppm/131.html

By: Antinous / Moderator

Antinous / Moderator — Fri, 23 Nov 2012 21:41:00 +0000

who the hell would want to steal the identity of a school student?

Vampires.

By: Mike Meyer

Mike Meyer — Fri, 23 Nov 2012 21:11:00 +0000

What I want to know is why they didn’t just chip them like housepets?

By: Mike Meyer

Mike Meyer — Fri, 23 Nov 2012 21:06:00 +0000

So, you won’t mind, then, if your employer institutes a similar system to see how much time you spend at the water cooler at work?

By: NESJumpman

NESJumpman — Fri, 23 Nov 2012 20:18:00 +0000

FWIW: Im not religious at all and I find this disturbing. Is taking roll call that difficult? We had assigned seats in classes and roll call took about 30 seconds. So the money for all this RFID equipment is worth not losing a few seconds at the start of class? Or take roll while students are working on something w/o direct instruction…

What am I missing here? I know this is not how the law works, but I would like to know why the school believes that this RFID is necessity – and justify the coffers argument – when there are alternatives.

By: GregS

GregS — Fri, 23 Nov 2012 17:59:00 +0000

Google “fast and furious” or “ATF gunwalking scandal”.

By: Navin_Johnson

Navin_Johnson — Fri, 23 Nov 2012 17:34:00 +0000

Same horrible property tax system here. Wealthy kids get fancy well appointed schools, everyone else gets the shaft.

By: Navin_Johnson

Navin_Johnson — Fri, 23 Nov 2012 17:29:00 +0000

Funny, I wonder if San Antonians (?) would get behind the teachers if they striked for schools to be more progressively funded. This is Texas after all.

By: Navin_Johnson

Navin_Johnson — Fri, 23 Nov 2012 17:23:00 +0000

Damn straight, now I’ve got to run off to Target and get some of those Black Friday deals!

By: Navin_Johnson

Navin_Johnson — Fri, 23 Nov 2012 17:19:00 +0000

Shifty administrators, performance pay, testing instead of teaching, districts run by bankers, that’s the right wing model that both Democrats and Republicans have sadly embraced.

By: TheOven

TheOven — Fri, 23 Nov 2012 16:08:00 +0000

No? I’d say it is. However, I’ll also qualify that by saying I’ve been thinking of this issue in terms of adults. Kids have less rights and are often tracked. Constantly actually.