It seems to me like another example of the parents blaming the school for their kid’s shortcomings. Another example of the “My kid failed” versus “You failed my kid” mentality.
That’s the biggest reason why I didn’t go into education. I would have enjoyed actually teaching. Not dealing with parents.
I believe (IANAL) it would be allowable under FERPA to say “we cannot provide any information about any over-18 student one way or another without their prior direct written consent” , but OTOH “we cannot answer because this student has invoked her FERPA rights and specifically requested so” could be argued to be revealing something’s not right.
Yeah. After her 18th birthday all of her grades should have said “unavailable” with a one sentence explanation that students over 18 need to give their written consent to have parents continue to view their grades. If it’s a privacy issue, all the grades should be concealed, not just the bad one. And “N/A” is a terrible way to put it.
They also should’ve answered the email with that same explanation.
I’m sure it’s allowable - I think the the problem with is with the bolded part : “we are unable to provide the grades to parents of adult students (18)** who have chosen to keep this information confidential.” **. I don’t see any reason why they couldn’t have answered in a generic way that doesn’t even confirm that the person in question is currently a student. They didn’t even have to mention consent in the answer - they could simply have said “We are legally prohibited from disclosing information to anyone other than your daughter as she is over 18”
I’m with spifflog about the lack of response. It’s inconceivable that the school would have simply hung up on the parents without a word if they had asked for the information in a phone call.They might have stopped answering the calls if the parents were psycho-calling to the point where staff recognized the phone number, but in my experience that takes more than two calls. On some level, I understand why people treat emails and voice mails differently than phone calls (because the other person is actually on the line with a phone call) but on another level, I don’t - It’s not significantly more time-consuming to answer an email than it is to have a phone conversation, and unanswered emails are likely to result in a phone call at some point.
There’s definitely a bigger problem that the English grade, though. It just hit me today that although the school wouldn’t disclose the grade because the student didn’t give permission, they apparently had no problem telling the columnist that the student often didn’t show up although they encouraged her to attend class and take tests. The spokeperson also told the columnist that the student was told that she could walk at graduation and no one other than she and her family would know that she didn’t receive a diploma. It seems that she must have agreed to allow the spokesperson to disclose this information to the columnist. Which to me suggests that she is not happy that her parents went to the media about this.
My understanding is that the student specifically advised the school that her parents were permitted to see all grades except English. (I’m somewhat local to Arlington and was told this by a parent who belongs to the Yorktown PTA, though, so it may well be a misunderstanding on that person’s part.)
I am baffled why they’re angry with the school. Ask her yourself. If she won’t tell you, well, that’s your issue, and has nothing to do with the school or it’s application of protocols, in my opinion.
Involving the school will only bring you up against the VERY same issue; she’s an adult now and doesn’t have to tell you. It’s still their issue with her, to my eyes.
Slight nitpick, it was a column in the Washington post, not an article. If the Student had sued, the Posts response would have been to write a factual article about it without comment. As to what Jay Mathews response would have been, that might be a more relevant question.
Its a small thing but it gives the impression, mistakenly on your part I hope, that the news arm of the Washington Post had drawn this opinionated conclusion. Which irks me the same way that political ads that say “Obama administration is hopelessly corrupt -Washington Post” as if it were factual reporting when in fact it appeared in an OP-ed by George Will that was published in the post.
Very valid point – thanks for the correction.
If that is the letter of the law. If permission is assumed for a High School student over 18 barring opt out or revocation of that permission then saying such is not accurate. But whatever the law is stating it was the appropriate response.
Is it standard that all High School grades of all students 18 and over are not visible to parents without a signed student permission on record?
There are some exceptions ( like for students who meet IRS definition of dependent-which I suspect would require the school to have a copy of the parental tax return) but in general, written consent is required. It’s not a case where consent is assumed unless the student opts out.
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FTR this is required when a student has an IEP (But in Colorado the age of educational majority is 21 not 18)
Wait, are we sure the REQUEST itself is confidential?
And even if it is, how is “I cannot disclose that information. You’ll need to speak to your daughter.” a FERPA violation?
In which case the student’s request for information to be withheld is immaterial. It is withheld unless written consent is obtained. (Funny though, I’m on my fourth High Schooler and I’ve never heard of any family having an issue in High School or needing to get the student to sign a form for parents to maintain access to grades. Needing to get the forms signed for college sure.)
I don’t remember hearing anyone mention a problem either - but because the school cut-off here is December 31, roughly half should turn 18 after graduation. I suspect of the remaining half , most either show the parents the grades voluntarily or sign the consent when the parents ask them to - and people wouldn’t necessarily mention those situations to others. I personally wouldn’t have told anybody even if my 18 year old kid had outright refused to allow me to know her grades.
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As far as an IEP goes, federal law states the school must notify parents of the transfer of parental rights to the student not less than one year BEFORE the student turns 18. This is included in the IEP, itself. The age of majority in Virginia is 18. The student in the OP was a transfer student on an IEP. This means that the notification had to have been done by her former high school, Washington-Lee. Her parents had to attend that IEP meeting and sign off on the IEP, which is gone over point by point at the meeting. They were also given copies.
Parents also must be notified by letter when the child turns 18 that those rights are being transferred to the student. Again, federal law.
So the parents in the OP would have been notified this would happen twice, once one year before the student turned 18, and again when she turned 18.
I called the secretary at the HS where I taught and asked what would happen if a student blocked parents from seeing a grade and parents then inquired. Our school software can’t block one grade: had ALL the OP student’s grades been blocked, the parents would have suspected what was going on sooner. I wonder if this shouldn’t be an all-or-nothing policy in all schools. Secretary said whether it was a counselor, a teacher, or herself, the case would have been referred to an administrator to answer parents. YMMV.
Amazing, all the angst about this. Their Daughter could have had multiple under-age abortions during High School without the Parents being notified by anyone; yet, this causes a hissy-fit? After she’s 18?
In terms of possibilities? Because the student genuinely fears for their safety if their parents find out that the student has had the gall to request that the school withhold any information at all. Parenting by fear means students are justifiably forced to hide the truth at the first opportunity they get to do so. And it’s important for their safety that the actual fact they are hiding the truth, is also hidden.
I wouldn’t be surprised if the student didn’t use this red herring in arguing with her folks. “Sure, I blocked you from seeing my grade and then lied about it! But hey, I could have legally had multiple sex partners and several abortions! I mean, it’s not like graduating high school is important, right?”
When I was in high school, or even middle school for that matter, the district sent out report cards every 12 weeks, I think. I forget what our terms were called, but the year was split into two equal length periods and there was a flutter of reporting in between and after finals. I’d ask my folks but I haven’t spoken to them in over two years so, take my post with a grain of salt in terms of this being normal.
As a quick follow-up, I wrote the following to the VP at my daughters Catholic HS:
I received this response this morning:
It will be interesting to see how… or if… they address this. Again, thanks for bringing this up, Bricker.