The approved-tool list, and what a vendor's no-training promise does not settle
Lesson 5 of 6 · Student data and the line you cannot cross
1 · Learn the move · Comparison matrix
Vendors say two things that sound like the same thing and are not. 'We do not train on your data' is a contract term about the model. Whether the vendor is a 'school official' with a 'legitimate educational interest', which is what lets a district share records with it at all, is a determination the district makes under the federal law and its own contract [P], and no vendor's marketing page makes it for them. So the matrix for any tool has three columns, not one: is it on my district's approved list; what does the contract say about retention and training; and what is the tool's own data policy for the plan I would actually use, which on a free consumer plan often differs from the enterprise one. A tool that passes the second and third and fails the first is not approved. Ask; do not infer.
Here is my district's approved-tool list and the published data policy of a tool I want to use: [paste both]. Build a matrix with one row for the tool and these columns: on the approved list (quote the entry or write NOT LISTED); what the policy says about training on inputs (quote); retention (quote); whether the plan I would use is the one the policy covers (quote the plan name); who at the district would decide. Do not conclude that the tool is permitted or safe; a no-training term is not a school-official determination.
2 · Your turn. You write the prompt
A Ridgeway High teacher finds a tool that makes rubrics in seconds. Its site says it never trains on user data. The district's approved list does not name it. The teacher builds the matrix: NOT LISTED; no-training term quoted, applies to the paid plan; retention thirty days on the free plan, not stated for paid; the plan she would use is free. Three columns, three different answers, and the first one decides. She sends the request to the Director of Technology with the matrix attached.
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