Lainey Hemison testifies on DOE's weak vendor oversight and YouTube workarounds

Oh, you can turn the mic on.

Thank you for holding the hearings today, Chairs Dinowitz and Shekar Krishnan.

My testimony, written testimony, is very detailed.

I'm just going to make some points after listening to the DOE testimony today.

I think they said only 78 software programs they use.

By law, they have to post the software programs that have access to personal student data, and there are more than 700, and we know that that's a minimum.

I'm very skeptical that just asking vendors whether they use AI is sufficient with no verification techniques.

In general, we've seen very shoddy and weak oversight from the Department of Education when it comes to making sure that these products comply with state law.

And it came out today that their invented IRMA process doesn't even ask the vendors which AI programs they use and what data they collect and how it's used.

It is illegal under state law to use data mine personal student data for product improvement, and yet we've seen that in the privacy policies of many of these vendors and their sub-processors.

Thank you for your advocacy around YouTube.

For nearly two years, the DOE allowed YouTube to be assigned to students, even though they were told by both Google, the owner,

and by the state education department that Google had announced that YouTube would no longer comply with the state law.

Now they say they're going to use a workaround by allowing teachers to embed YouTube into Google Classroom, which will not provide the same privacy violations.

And yet I've asked several tech experts who say that that still may not work

in terms of being allowed to look at the IP address and then monitor the students'use of YouTube that way and still be able to use that for marketing purposes and targeted ads.

I have several recommendations for the bills.

I just wanted to, it's in my testimony, the bills that have been introduced, but I really want to urge you to introduce a new one, which would require

the reporting of screen time in schools by grade and which specific uses and apps and programs are exempt from those requirements.

We've seen very contradictory testimony today about whether it's required or just advised those limits.

We even know in the early grades it's only advised, and then there's still so many exemptions in terms of diagnostics assessments.

And basically what principals are telling teachers that all the apps that are being used, even in those earliest grades, can be exempt.

as long as they're calling them assessments, diagnostics, and screeners.

Thank you for the time.

Thank you.