Join us on Thursday, May 16th for engaging and informative sessions focused on critical topics for school district personnels, building leaders, and educators. Participants will delve into essential areas related to student privacy, data sharing, and compliance with the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA). You’ll explore effective strategies for vetting educational technology tools and have the opportunity to participate in a hacking simulation and learn ways to make cybersecurity incident response more effective. Our expert presenters from the U.S. Department of Education's Privacy Technical Assistance Center (PTAC) will guide us through these crucial topics. 

Don’t miss this chance to enhance your knowledge and contribute to a secure educational environment. Register now and be part of this valuable learning experience!   

NOTE: Registration is free. At the conclusion of the training, clock hours are available for purchase. Clock hours are $3.00 per clock hour with a $15.00 minimum.

Agenda & Session Descriptions

8:30am – 12:00pm : Select a Topic


TOPIC 1: CYBERSECURITY  

Black Hat Academy   
Have you ever wondered how hackers do what they do? Ever wanted to hack a school? Well grab your hoodie and hot pockets and join us for a hands-on workshop where YOU get to be the bad guy! In this session, we'll give you access to a virtual lab set up to simulate a school district, complete with the software and hardware commonly employed by real schools. Created in the style of a "Capture the Flag" contest, you can go at it alone, or team up with other attendees to hack and exploit these systems to gain control of the simulated "school" and steal sensitive simulated "student records" for bragging rights and all the lolz. The first step to defeating a hacker is to think like one, so take the red pill and join us as we hack a school!  

Free Cookies: How I Lured You to a Talk on Incident Response Best Practices  
Let's face it, social engineering is effective. You like cookies, you are also likely to be part of a cybersecurity incident. So, scratch both itches by coming to this talk and browsing for cookies while you learn ways to make cybersecurity incident response less of a hassle, and way more effective. Join PTAC while we talk about the critical business of planning for and responding to cyber incidents. A little planning and streamlining can save your school a ton of time and money, resolve incidents quicker, reduce potential harms, and help you maintain compliance no matter what state laws or regulations apply to you. Plus, there are cookies...so win-win.  


TOPIC 2: FERPA DATA SHARING & WRITTEN AGREEMENT  

Data Sharing Under FERPA  
This session highlights the basics of data sharing under the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA), with a focus on the FERPA exceptions under which data may be shared, the expectations regarding the security and privacy of education data, and data sharing best practices and requirements for complying with FERPA. As an outcome of this session, participants will gain enhanced clarity surrounding what data can and cannot be shared under FERPA and improve their knowledge of resources available to help ensure compliance with FERPA regulations.  

Transparency of School Data Collection: Improve Your Messaging  
The prospect of student data getting put into large data systems can be frightening to some parents. In the absence of knowing what is going on with their data, some students will assume the worst. Join us as we review best practices on communicating with parents about school and district data collection policies and practices. Specific attention will be paid to what information is collected, how it’s safeguarded and used, and why. We'll look at the good, the bad and the ugly of existing district websites and discuss what you can do to improve your messaging.  

12:00 – 1:00 pm LUNCH (on your own) 

1:00 – 3:00 pm FERPA Deep Dive   
Do you have questions about student privacy? Need to understand what your responsibilities are? Well, we're here to help! Join the U.S. Department of Education's Privacy Technical Assistance Center (PTAC) for deep dive on the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA), the principal federal law protecting student privacy. This presentation will introduce you to the fundamentals of FERPA and delve into a variety of real-world scenarios that concern student privacy. This session provides an excellent forum for discussion of complex issues regarding FERPA and a great space to have your questions answered. Do you think you have what it takes? To that we say, "It depends!" 

3:15 – 3:45pm Protection of Pupil Rights Amendment 
If you ask 100 educators if they have heard of FERPA before, 99 of them will raise their hand. If you ask 100 educators if they have heard of PPRA before, one will raise their hand. Join us for an overview of the little privacy law that nobody knows about and your districts responsibilities under it.

3:45 – 4:30 pm Vetting EdTech   
Do you use educational technology in your school?  Did you ever want help decoding the ‘legalese’ contained in those Terms of Service Agreement?  Did you ever wonder how those apps and services protect student privacy?  PTAC has the answers!  This session will explore both the importance of online educational technology and how it can be assessed for privacy protections and general compliance with the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA).

4:30 – 5:00 pm Q&A