AASA Joins National Organizations Endorsing COPPA 2.0

Today, AASA led a letter signed by ten national education and privacy organizations endorsing the updated version of the Children and Teens’ Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA 2.0). AASA takes student data privacy seriously and we strongly support updates and revisions to child privacy protections. At the same time, we believe that effectively incorporating edtech into classroom instruction is necessary to promote greater learning and success for all students and will help local education agencies best serve their communities.

The updated version of COPPA 2.0 makes significant updates that will improve child privacy while at the same time ensuring edtech used to enhance and address student learning can continue to be used when the school has contracted with an edtech vendor and has thoroughly vetted the platform for privacy and security safeguards. In particular, AASA is pleased that this legislation reaffirms that school districts can consent to data collection and use on behalf of parents in educational contexts if the technology services are solely for the use and benefit of the school. We also appreciate that COPPA 2.0 increases the age of individuals entitled to foundational privacy protections online from children under 13 to teens under 17. We wholeheartedly believe that children deserve heightened protections online, and that those protections should not disappear the day a child turns 13 years old. We also support how the bill requires different safeguards for children and teens, emphasizing oversight for children under 13 while giving older teens more autonomy over their online experiences. We look forward to continuing to work with Congress as the legislation moves forward in both chambers. 

Read our letter of support here.