Slashdot Mirror
Students and Bodies Tracked Via RFID Tags
AT writes "The Brittan School District in Sutter County, California, is requiring students to carry RFID-tagged identity badges on them at all times. Readers are currently installed at the doors to all classrooms. Readers were removed from bathrooms when parents protested. The school district is meeting next week to consider parents objections to the system." Relatedly (but not), Leilah writes "The University of California is considering using RFID tags or bar codes to help track their collection of bodies and parts. They are attempting to reopen their body donation program which has been on hold since spring 2004 due to disappearing parts - they've previously had legal trouble over improper disposal as well."
Total Law Enforcement rules. And the trains run on time, too!
Every year during my review, I just pray the words "slashdot.org" aren't mentioned.
I don't envy this kind of freedom....
Sounds like fun to carry.
which then is translated into the student's name by software contained in a handheld device used by teachers to check attendance.
I can see it now: "Hey, Mikey - take my badge and scan it for English class, or I'm gonna beat you up with it!"
Bueller... Bueller... Bueller...
I'm not a fan of radical RFID use. I'm skeptical of many uses, such as sticking them in bank cards so that when you step through the doors of your local branch, they know whether they can ignore you or if you're a significant enough customer that they should meet you at the door and give you tip-top attention.
This just doesn't seem like a big deal. Rather than wasting class time doing roll-call, they automate it so that as soon as you walk into the class, you're counted as present. This will help parents and school officials know that students are not missing and are where they should be. Maybe they'll even implement full blown java cards to ensure that only the AV-club students can access the AV room, only faculty can access the faculty lounge and so on. Even better would be requiring the use of a java card to gain access to the school at all. Swipe the card to get in the front door. No more lunatics wandering the halls.
Oh, and most adults have to use these cards in the real world, too. The only difference is that we have to swipe our cards and that swipe usually ends up in a database, logging the time, door and building we entered. The only difference here is that the RFID readers in the door eliminate the need to swipe the card.
I also don't see the big deal with tagging body parts like this. It enforced accountability and I'm pretty sure dead people or someone who no longer has that arm attached to them doesn't much care what happens to it - tagged or not.
Also, any remotely intelligent kid will just wrap the card with a couple layers of tin foil, stick it in their lunch box, etc.
Like I said, I'm a really skeptical person when it comes to RFIDs. I hate the idea of tagging, tracking and cataloging EVERYTHING under the sun. But these two cited implementations seem entirely reasonable.
Yeah, I'm totally for having to government replace parents and personal responsibility in general, too. I just don't know where I'd be today if I hadn't had Big Brother watching every move I made while I was in school.
It's amazing how quickly we've transformed from a country which at least claimed to value freedom, civil liberties and self-determination into one which pleads for the government to come in and run our lives, isn't it?
Every year during my review, I just pray the words "slashdot.org" aren't mentioned.
Parents that either don't care about their child's education, or ones that think their child is immune to the rules or does no wrong are the real problem with the school system.
Free Mac Mini
Hey, as long as we're shifting the blame from teachers to parents, why don't we go ahead and shift it to where it belongs, the students. EVERYBODY'S parent suck. Some worse than others. That is no excuse to go blaming your parents or anybody else for your own actions. Everybody, deep down, knows what is right. Even my three year olds do, because when they are doing bad things, they stop as soon as I come in the room.
If people don't do what is right, then they are to blame, not their parents, not their teachers, not society. If we are to get anywhere as a species, everyone has to be held accountable and responsible for themselves.
Yes, I realize this could be devastating to the law profession, which feeds mainly upon people holding other people responsible for their own foolish actions or lack of common sense.
If you are not allowed to question your government then the government has answered your question.
Frankly, I don't really see any problem with the tracking of the kids, per se. It doesn't tell you what they're doing in the bathroom... it just lets you know that they are in the bathroom... which I don't regard as an invasion of privacy, really. All in all, it's good to keep close track of those meddling kids.
However....
The thing about this that really freaks me out is that it might give us a group of future voters who view this level of tracking as "the way things are". I'm someone who considers the Patriot act to be a dangerous step in the direction of Nazi Germany. However, I think that a group of kids just graduating from a school where they wore, essentially, tracking beacons for four year will think that the Patriot Act is downright lax.
Exactly. This is a case of gratuitous use of excessive technology where pen and paper are capable of doing the job precisely as accurately, almost as efficiently, and much more cheaply.
The only motivation for this is surveillance for the sake of surveillance: to spy on students in forums where the school knows it would not normally have the right to spy on them. (I am reminded of how I, as a non-USAian, have to provide the FBI with my photo and fingerprints every time I enter the US. That isn't to catch crooks or terrorists: it's surveillance for the sake of surveillance.)
Oh, and by the way, we have always been at war with Eurasia.
If you're a single mother, you made a mistake. I don't support your decision and I think the world would be a better place if abortions were forced upon you. Just the other night I saw on the news a 19 year old girl who had 3 children and was being brought up on child neglect charges. It is simply sickening. Society, as a whole, needs to tell these swine that if you have that many children and that young of an age, you are the scum of the Earth and the planet would be better off without you. I am sick and tired of supporting someone else's mistake. And of course, those 3 children will grow up to either steal my car, have children they can't support just like their mother, or both.
My mother was single.
I don't steal cars and, as yet, I've not had children that I can't support. I'm three units away from a university degree, I work part time as a software engineer and I do a lot of contract work on the side.
And in my opinion, the education system will never teach anybody who doesn't want to learn: whether they have good familes or bad families, it all comes down to the individual.
Honestly, you bitch and bitch like you know what you're talking about.
You don't, it shows: families aren't perfect. You're obviously not in such a situation, so for fuck's sake stop moaning like you're somehow better than these women. You're not. It's not up to you to judge moral values.
People make mistakes. Life goes on.
The difference, as I see it is removing the basic trust given to students by the school. As it stands, if you show up late for a class, and say you got held late in the previous one, the teacher can say trust you and not mark you as late.
It's a basic human system. Students in high school are becoming adults. As such, they need to be given some freedom, and shown that they can go outside the lines a bit as long as it isn't excessive, and still be ok. The world is not out to get them, but if they completely disregard the rules, then they will be in trouble.
This system changes that. Now anytime you step outside the lines, it can be tracked, every story checked. You, from day 1 entering the school, are treated as if you are guilty. Now we are saying to students who enter the schoool: "we know you're gonna screw up, and we want to be able to prove it when you do."
Yeah but turn this around. Let's say the student loses his name tag and some other kids find it. Those kids enter some unauthorized area and cause damage. I guarantee you the school will come looking for the student. When he/she says he lost his ID card, they'll just suspend him for not having his ID card. They might do that on top of holding him accountable for breaking stuff.
Basically, you're shifting the burden of proof onto the accused - guilty until proven innocent. Very bad move! It's no wonder kids don't understand their constitutional rights when we treat them like cattle.
Oh, and in regards to your original statement, the school won't even check the records until something happens. It won't prevent anything except make it easier for the school to point and say "You broke the rules here, here, and here." Most of the rules broken are usually asinine in the first place, and no reasonable person would follow them. In doing this, the school also violates the right of every single other student following the rules.