Parents in Polk County, Florida are outraged after learning that students in area schools had their irises scanned as part of a new security program without obtaining proper permission.
Students at three facilities — an elementary school, a grade
school and a high school — had their eyeballs scanned earlier
this month as part of a ‘student safety’ pilot program being
carried out by Stanley Convergent Security Solutions.
“It simply takes a picture of the iris, which is unique to
every individual,” Rob Davis, the school board’s senior
director of support services, wrote home to parents in a letter
dated May 23. “With this program, we will be able to identify
when and where a student gets on the bus, when they arrive at
their school location, when and what bus the student boards and
disembarks in the afternoon. This is an effort to further enhance
the safety of our students.The EyeSwipe-Nano is an ideal
replacement for the card based system since your child will not
have to be responsible for carrying an identification card,”
he added.
Parents at Daniel Jenkins Academy, Bephune Academy and the
Davenport School of the Arts received the letter from the school
board on May 24 informing them of the EyeSwipe-Nano program and
that their child’s principal should be notified if they don’t
want their son or daughter to participate.
But elsewhere in the letter, the board explained that the program
would begin last Monday, May 20. By the time the letter was
received on Friday, iris scans had already been completed at the
three area schools without a single student opting out, Angel
Clark wrote for The Examiner this week.
Because Memorial Day landed on May 27, parents were unable to
receive confirmation from the school until this Tuesday, nearly
one week after the scans began.
In the letter, Davis described the scanning as a safe and
noninvasive way of collecting students’ biometric data as a way
of ensuring the safety of pupils in the Polk County school
district. Parents are appalled that they weren’t informed of the
program ahead of time, though, and are calling it an invasion of
privacy.
“It seems like they are mostly focused on this program, like
the program was the problem. It's not, it's the invasion of my
family's Constitutional right to privacy that is the problem, as
well as the school allowing a private company access to my child
without my consent or permission,” one concerned parent wrote
in a Facebook post that has since been shared hundreds of times.
“This is stolen information, and we cannot retrieve it.”
When the parent reached the school on Tuesday, she was told that
the program was suspended.
Reporter Michelle Malkin caught up with Davis on Wednesday and he
apologized for the board’s actions and confirmed that the data
had been destroyed.
“Davis told me that ‘it is a mistake on our part’ that a
notification letter to parents did not go out on May 17,” she
wrote. “He blamed a secretary who had a ‘medical
emergency.’”
Polks planned to install EyeSwipe-Nano units on 17 local school
busses starting next year. The scandal comes just months after a
high school student in Texas was suspended for refusing to wear
an identification card to class.