Had anyone done FOIA request with FERPA to get emails?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am a special educator, but not in your district. We were told by our district’s legal team that any communication that has identifiable student information (name, initials, student ID number, etc.) is open to subpoena, including text messages on personal phones (which would be a clear FERPA violation anyway). Your district is going to do everything they can to avoid giving you this info, so please take everything they tell you with a grain of salt. You need a lawyer! In the meantime, include a list of all “searchable terms” about your child in the letter you send telling the district not to destroy any communication about your child, including name, nickname, initials, student ID number, birthdate, and any other things you have heard staff call the child. Staff does communicate about students via email and, very likely, via text message on their private phones; this communication is usually out of necessity and to benefit the child (“did you finish Larla’s present levels?”, “FYI, our little friend is super tired today.”, “can you attend an IEP on 5/27 for 12345?”, etc.), but it exists. Good luck!

Out of curiosity: how is the personal cell phone info gathered? Would I as a teacher be required to turn over ALL of my cell phone text message records all though that would compromise confidential information on other children —both other students and my own child? Or would I have to print out and submit the relevant messages? I ask because every field trip, we are required to join a group text. I teach magnet so I only know about 100 of the 300+ students. If I saw a message like “Security has already spoken to our special friend.” I would not know who that was, but I might also have a text from my DC’s therapist or a text from the nurse with another student’s asthma action plan because it was left on campus accidentally.

If I’d have to turn over everything, I’d rather just get a second cheap dumb phone and use that strictly for school.

I don’t know exactly, since I’ve never had to turn over my phone/texts, but the way our legal team explained it to us indicated that the phone could be subpoenaed if we use it to communicate about students. So, if some other teacher texts me about a student and her communications are requested, my phone could get requested too. Most teachers I know use their personal phones, but communicate via app (class dojo or whatever) that is backed up on the web. Our policy is to use names or initials but not put anythying in writing that we wouldn’t want parents to see/is unprofessional.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am a special educator, but not in your district. We were told by our district’s legal team that any communication that has identifiable student information (name, initials, student ID number, etc.) is open to subpoena, including text messages on personal phones (which would be a clear FERPA violation anyway). Your district is going to do everything they can to avoid giving you this info, so please take everything they tell you with a grain of salt. You need a lawyer! In the meantime, include a list of all “searchable terms” about your child in the letter you send telling the district not to destroy any communication about your child, including name, nickname, initials, student ID number, birthdate, and any other things you have heard staff call the child. Staff does communicate about students via email and, very likely, via text message on their private phones; this communication is usually out of necessity and to benefit the child (“did you finish Larla’s present levels?”, “FYI, our little friend is super tired today.”, “can you attend an IEP on 5/27 for 12345?”, etc.), but it exists. Good luck!

Out of curiosity: how is the personal cell phone info gathered? Would I as a teacher be required to turn over ALL of my cell phone text message records all though that would compromise confidential information on other children —both other students and my own child? Or would I have to print out and submit the relevant messages? I ask because every field trip, we are required to join a group text. I teach magnet so I only know about 100 of the 300+ students. If I saw a message like “Security has already spoken to our special friend.” I would not know who that was, but I might also have a text from my DC’s therapist or a text from the nurse with another student’s asthma action plan because it was left on campus accidentally.

If I’d have to turn over everything, I’d rather just get a second cheap dumb phone and use that strictly for school.

I don’t know exactly, since I’ve never had to turn over my phone/texts, but the way our legal team explained it to us indicated that the phone could be subpoenaed if we use it to communicate about students. So, if some other teacher texts me about a student and her communications are requested, my phone could get requested too. Most teachers I know use their personal phones, but communicate via app (class dojo or whatever) that is backed up on the web. Our policy is to use names or initials but not put anythying in writing that we wouldn’t want parents to see/is unprofessional.

Thank you. I wonder if I switched to an app if they would just go to the app’s database or still want my phone. I’m also thinking now about how I use my phone to scan student work to pdf or do dozens of small work tasks conveniently. If I have to worry about sending my DC’s medical records to the attorney of a parent suing my school, I don’t want to use my phone for work at all. I imagine the parent has a right to see whatever is gathered?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am a special educator, but not in your district. We were told by our district’s legal team that any communication that has identifiable student information (name, initials, student ID number, etc.) is open to subpoena, including text messages on personal phones (which would be a clear FERPA violation anyway). Your district is going to do everything they can to avoid giving you this info, so please take everything they tell you with a grain of salt. You need a lawyer! In the meantime, include a list of all “searchable terms” about your child in the letter you send telling the district not to destroy any communication about your child, including name, nickname, initials, student ID number, birthdate, and any other things you have heard staff call the child. Staff does communicate about students via email and, very likely, via text message on their private phones; this communication is usually out of necessity and to benefit the child (“did you finish Larla’s present levels?”, “FYI, our little friend is super tired today.”, “can you attend an IEP on 5/27 for 12345?”, etc.), but it exists. Good luck!

Out of curiosity: how is the personal cell phone info gathered? Would I as a teacher be required to turn over ALL of my cell phone text message records all though that would compromise confidential information on other children —both other students and my own child? Or would I have to print out and submit the relevant messages? I ask because every field trip, we are required to join a group text. I teach magnet so I only know about 100 of the 300+ students. If I saw a message like “Security has already spoken to our special friend.” I would not know who that was, but I might also have a text from my DC’s therapist or a text from the nurse with another student’s asthma action plan because it was left on campus accidentally.

If I’d have to turn over everything, I’d rather just get a second cheap dumb phone and use that strictly for school.

I don’t know exactly, since I’ve never had to turn over my phone/texts, but the way our legal team explained it to us indicated that the phone could be subpoenaed if we use it to communicate about students. So, if some other teacher texts me about a student and her communications are requested, my phone could get requested too. Most teachers I know use their personal phones, but communicate via app (class dojo or whatever) that is backed up on the web. Our policy is to use names or initials but not put anythying in writing that we wouldn’t want parents to see/is unprofessional.

Thank you. I wonder if I switched to an app if they would just go to the app’s database or still want my phone. I’m also thinking now about how I use my phone to scan student work to pdf or do dozens of small work tasks conveniently. If I have to worry about sending my DC’s medical records to the attorney of a parent suing my school, I don’t want to use my phone for work at all. I imagine the parent has a right to see whatever is gathered?

If you use your personal phone for any work purpose the other side can subpoena your phone. The parent is generally not entitled to your personal emails, but a judge will decide what's personal and what isn't, so it's best just to keep work stuff off your personal phone.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is the district FERPA office telling me this process. I don’t trust them, but I am seeing some online references to emails not being special education records.

We are past the friendly point. My child was the one where the janitor sat on them. The school hasn’t followed through on the commitments they made to train staff and provide services. I am working to engage an attorney locally but it will be September/ October before we can meet.

You can ask a regular attorney to send a letter asking them to preserve all records. This will keep you in a holding pattern until you can engage a specialist.

[Anonymous]

I was FOIA’d. The FOIA officer called and asked if I used my phone for any texting or to upload documents. I don’t so I said no. They don’t just search right away. I make sure if I do send emails to colleagues about a student, then I use initials. I don’t even use parent names. This was in DCPs. The parent has to pay the administrative fee for the request.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is the district FERPA office telling me this process. I don’t trust them, but I am seeing some online references to emails not being special education records.

We are past the friendly point. My child was the one where the janitor sat on them. The school hasn’t followed through on the commitments they made to train staff and provide services. I am working to engage an attorney locally but it will be September/ October before we can meet.

File a complaint with the state for unlawful restraint. Why can’t you meet with an attorney before sept/oct?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I was FOIA’d. The FOIA officer called and asked if I used my phone for any texting or to upload documents. I don’t so I said no. They don’t just search right away. I make sure if I do send emails to colleagues about a student, then I use initials. I don’t even use parent names. This was in DCPs. The parent has to pay the administrative fee for the request.

Those are still student records and if you don’t turn them over you are breaking the law.

[Anonymous]

HI OP, can’t speak to Frye FOIA issue but I am an attorney that does education work and it is indeed correct that emails are not covered by FERPA.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was FOIA’d. The FOIA officer called and asked if I used my phone for any texting or to upload documents. I don’t so I said no. They don’t just search right away. I make sure if I do send emails to colleagues about a student, then I use initials. I don’t even use parent names. This was in DCPs. The parent has to pay the administrative fee for the request.

Those are still student records and if you don’t turn them over you are breaking the law.

dCPS turns over emails. I don’t go through the server and pick and chose. As I said, I don’t use my phone for work. Central office looks at emails and turns them over. We don’t, so there is nothing I’m actually doing wrong or hiding. Why would you think a teacher would be the one to turn over work emails. We don’t have access to deleted emails on the server.

I just don’t use kids names anymore as we were all told to do so. I also don’t use my personal email for work. I don’t use my phone to scan. It’s not worth the headache.