“Flaws” in SD57 Software Under Investigation
Prince George, B.C. – An investigation is underway into reported “flaws” in a new software system School District 57 is using.
That from superintendent Brian Pepper in light of a complaint made by D.P. Todd Secondary School teacher Glen Thielmann on social media yesterday.
“School District 57 administration is aware of Mr. Thielmann’s Tweets and both the Ministry of Education and the service provider (MyEdBC) have been informed and are investigating the circumstances around this case,” says Pepper.
“As you’re aware, MyEdBC complies with all requirements outlined in the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy legislation (FOIPPA). We know that thorough privacy impact assessments were completed and have been reviewed by both the office of the Office of the Chief Information Officer and of course the Office of the Privacy Commissioner.”
All of this after Thielmann took to Twitter yesterday to voice his concerns:
“#MyEdBC breaks #bced & #foippa rules. Today, landed on screen w/ all my school’s past/present students: bdays, Med & SpEd & AbEd notes, etc.”
He later clarified his comments on the 250 News website.
“After a secure login I was provided access to a data set that I’m not supposed to see according to FOIPPA,” said Thielmann. “I ended up with a 64 page report that should not have been accessible. Our staff informed the ministry and the issue was resolved within a few hours.”
He clearly wasn’t impressed with what transpired. “Our principals and support staff should not (have) to work overtime to mitigate design flaws in the software – not just security, but performance flaws,” he said.
“The BCED procurement process for a new data management system was supposed to ensure a high standard for function and privacy. So far I’m not impressed.”
Pepper has assured 250 News that the “flaws” are in no way connected to the provincial government’s loss of a hard-drive containing the personal information of 3.4 million students.
“It’s not connected at all,” says Pepper. “These are two different things.”
Comments
“These are two different things.”
Both of which show a a lack of oversight by management staff. One, for not knowing where a hard drive had been stored and how to access it. The other for not having the software thoroughly tested before being put into use. That must be the case because a thorough beta test would have identified the problem. That is, after all, what beta testing is for. Still, once again I notice that the righties automatically try to blame unionised employees instead of holding responsible those who decided to use what turns out to be flawed software, upper management in the DOE.
To begin, any system, especially a custom application intended for a massive government deployment will have inherent deficiencies, period.
Second, if this system is in any way related to the social services ICM system, then is was originally a sales solution for major industrial marketing.
Third, when an employee is enrolled in a database system, their rights are defined by a view of the data, and that is not always accurate. So the system itself is as it should be.
Fourth, no new computer system is ever completely tested. Even Microsoft gets its customers to report testing results.
fifth, why is this employee making such a stink over something that is more about foippa responsibility than system controls or completeness. In other words, foippa does not define system requirements, it defines what information can be distributed to whom and under what conditions. All this staff had to do was keep lips tight shut, then there would not be a privacy issue.
As a systems person, you would not believe what I have seen on personal and business computers. Then we have smart phones that are integrated with your email.
As usual much ado about nothing other then a chance to clink their collective political armor. Saddens me that people that despise their employer, their responsibilities, their jobs are teaching. As for software being perfect out of the box apparently they’ve never ran a new Windows program, after a year of beta testing it still has bugs … common. Teachers are just irked the money was spent on this software and not wages so it will never be ok for them.
A piece of software (MyEdBC??) allows a teacher to view data which the individual is not cleared for. Administration is blamed for using the defective program.
A SD57 pool car causes an inadvertent deployment of an air bag as a teacher starts the car. The administration is blamed for purchasing a defective car.
In one case administrators have no expertise in programming and in the other they have no expertise in auto mechanics.
Why on earth would someone blame administration who have likely gone to the extent of due diligence which is the norm or even best practices in today’s society??
http://www.timescolonist.com/news/local/b-c-to-replace-troubled-student-tracking-software-1.560321
The system this one is replacing never did work. It cost us $97000000. This one cost a similar “undisclosed” amount. Anyone who uses BC gov software knows it is often very poor. Rather than beating up this teacher we should look at the people procuring this over priced half baked software. Many other school boards saw the writing on the wall and opted out of this one. Why didn’t ours. Thats a legit question.
Mr. Thielmann did not lay blame on the school district. He just said that there was a problem. I don’t understand why people are reacting to things he didn’t say.
My employer has online training software that one logs onto to complete training updates. One time I was just looking around and came across a link to driver abstracts and I could bring up anyone’s drivers abstract. I wasn’t sure what I was linking to so I just tried some random names I knew and was getting legit drivers abstracts on them.
Some people I never would have thought, but they had things I am pretty sure they wouldn’t want public. I brought up a few ‘funnies’ to management that they didn’t like and it got fixed right away.
There .. Software glitch. LoL
I work in a BC school district and have used and supported both the old and new systems. Let me clear up a few misconceptions in the comments.
ammonra: “…for not having the software thoroughly tested before being put into use”
The software is a commercial, off the shelf Student Information System (SIS) that has been used by schools all over the world for years. It has had lots of testing. This incident is more likely that someone in SD57 gave that teacher the wrong role when setting up their account as opposed to a flaw in the software.
Loki: “if this system is in any way related to the social services ICM system, then is was originally a sales solution for major industrial marketing”
This system is a software suite called “Aspen” made by a company called “Follett” It was given some BC specific features and branded “MyEducationBC”
ken111: “The system this one is replacing never did work.”
FALSE. We used the old system for 10 years and it did work. The notion that it never did work is political hooey. Was it perfect? No! Were there things we wished we could do with it that it couldn’t? Yes! That’s part of the reason it got replaced; however, any software tool you use is always going to leave you with a wish list of more features you want to see. The main reason it got replaced was because Pearson Education Systems bought the company that made the old system so they could shut it down any try to get the province to buy into their SIS instead.
http://www.pearsoned.com/news/pearson-acquires-the-administrative-assistants-ltd/
ken111: “It cost us $97000000. This one cost a similar “undisclosed” amount. ”
The old system cost school districts $10 per student per year. The new system costs exactly the same. That’s the same or LESS than what it was costing districts when everyone ran their own independent systems. And now districts are no longer responsible for the costs of hosting, fixing, maintaining, backing up, and running the new system. The Ministry covers that part while providing better security and adherence to privacy than districts were doing on their own. $97M over 10 years is about $16 per student. We’re saving money by running this system.
As an aside, I was surprised to discover that the Ministry does not collect information on enrollments by subject. It is not possible to find out how many students in the province took German or First Nations Studies 12 or Law or whatever. This would not be difficult to collect, poses no privacy problems since the information is anonymous, and would presumably be useful for deciding on allocation of resources for creating new materials, training teachers, advertising courses, etc.
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