Student Tracking Tags Likened to '1984'

Parents are voicing privacy concerns over an electronic tracking system proposed for New Canaan schools. One parent likened it to George Orwell’s Big Brother.

“Having students carry around RFID devices smacks of George Orwell’s 1984,” Frederick Chang told the Board of Education at a meeting last week. RFID stands for radio frequency identification tag. A Westport security firm, SecureRF, is seeking board approval to test the tags in New Canaan.

Schools Superintendent David Abbey said the district has not made a decision on the  project. He said school officials are waiting to see if SecureRF will receive a $100,000 grant for the program from the National Science Foundation.

In a trial project tags would be used to track students or equipment, Abbey said, and student involvement would be voluntary and require parents’ approval. He added that students would not be tracked off campus.

A document at SecureRF’s Web site says the reading devices for the cards would be set so that tracking would stop at the edge of the campus.

“It’s very preliminary. We are not doing anything yet,” Abbey said.  “We will have to see if it’s a plan for us [if the grant is approved].” At the board’s Sept. 7 meeting, Chang said though he opposes using tags to track students he approves using them to keep track of equipment.

Joanne Kelleher, a spokeswoman for Secure RF, said the research project is “to determine if strong authentication and security measures can be established so wireless auto-identification technology can be safely and securely used on a school campus.”

Any testing would not begin until the spring of 2011. High School  Principal Tony Pavia said he would be interested in the program for different uses, such as consolidating the number of cards students carry. Pavia said he’s not interested in tracking students’ movements.

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