II

106TH CONGRESS

1ST SESSION S. 1908

To protect students from commercial exploitation.

IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES

NOVEMBER 10, 1999

Mr. DODD introduced the following bill; which was read twice and referred to

the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions

A BILL

To protect students from commercial exploitation.

1 Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa2 tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,

3 SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

4 This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Student Privacy Pro5 tection Act’’.

6 SEC. 2. PRIVACY FOR STUDENTS.

7 Part E of title XIV of the Elementary and Secondary

8 Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 8891 et seq.) is amend9 ed by adding at the end the following:

10 ‘‘SEC. 14515. PRIVACY FOR STUDENTS.

11 ‘‘(a) IN GENERAL.—None of the funds authorized

12 under this Act may be used by an applicable program to
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1 allow a third party to monitor, receive, gather, or obtain

2 information intended for commercial purposes from any

3 student under 18 years of age without prior, written, in4 formed consent of the parent of the student.

5 ‘‘(b) INTENTION OF THIRD PARTY.—Before a school,

6 local educational agency, or State, as the case may be,

7 enters into a contract with a third party, the school, agen8 cy, or State shall inquire whether the third party intends

9 to gather, collect, or store information on students, the

10 nature of the information to be gathered, how the informa11 tion will be used, whether the information will be sold, dis12 tributed, or transferred to other parties and the amount

13 of class time, if any, that will be consumed by such activ14 ity.

15 ‘‘(c) CONSENT FORM.—The consent form referred to

16 in subsection (a) shall indicate the dollar amount and na17 ture of the contract between a school, local educational

18 agency, or State, as the case may be, and a third party,

19 including the nature of the information to be gathered,

20 how the information will be used, if the information will

21 be sold, distributed, or transferred to other parties, and

22 the amount of class time, if any, that will be consumed

23 by such activity.’’.
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1 SEC. 3. GAO STUDY.

2 (a) IN GENERAL.—The Comptroller General of the

3 United States shall conduct a study in accordance with

4 subsection (b) regarding the prevalence and effect of com5 mercialism in elementary and secondary education.

6 (b) CONTENTS.—The study shall—

7 (1) document the nature, extent, demographics,

8 and trends of commercialism (commercial adver9 tising, sponsorships of programs and activities, ex10 clusive agreements, incentive programs, appropria11 tion of space, sponsored educational materials, elec12 tronic marketing, market research, and privatization

13 of management) in elementary and secondary

14 schools receiving funds under the Elementary and

15 Secondary Education Act of 1965;

16 (2) consider the range of benefits and costs,

17 educational, public health, financial and social, of

18 such commercial arrangements in classrooms; and

19 (3) consider how commercial arrangements in

20 schools affect student privacy, particularly in re21 gards to new technologies such as the Internet, in22 cluding the type of information that is collected on

23 students, how it is used, and the manner in which

24 schools inform parents before information is col25 lected.

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