Taunton schools scrap fingerprint-scanning plans
Idea considered for the cafeteria
After mounting protests from parents and civil libertarians, the Taunton School Committee voted this week to scrap plans to let students pay for lunch by scanning their fingerprints.
Committee members, who voted 7 to 1 against the plan Wednesday night, said yesterday that they were opposed, even after school officials said it would be voluntary, because it might have exposed the district to lawsuits and because it had become too much of a distraction from more pressing issues.
The district planned to scan two fingerprints from each student, which would have been converted into a number linked to a meal account. Students buying lunch would have tapped their finger on a reader that brought up their account.
‘‘I’m not against choice; I’m against scanning,’’ said Cathal O’Brien, one of the School Committee members who voted against the proposal. ‘‘With over 8,000 students in our district, you might have children scanned accidentally.’’
School officials argued that the system would have sped up the cafeteria line, allowed parents to monitor their children’s diet, and reduced the stigma on poor students who receive free or reduced-price lunches. They also insisted that the system, which would have been among the first in Massachusetts, would have been secure because the fingerprint image would not have been stored, using only a numeric representation.
Superintendent Arthur W. Stellar initially said the program would be mandatory. He suggested it be voluntary after parents began to complain, some of whom began showing up to School Committee meetings wearing ‘‘Ban the Scan’’ pins.
‘‘I think all the fears ran ahead of the facts,’’ Stellar said yesterday. ‘‘It would have been something nice to have, because it would have made the cafeterias more efficient, been less paperwork and labor, and it would have prevented losses and thefts. In the big picture, though, it’s not that critical.’’
The proposed Lunch Bytes system was to start next month in four elementary and two middle schools in the 16-school district. Committee member Jordan H. Fiore, who cast the only dissenting vote, told colleagues he supported the new technology.
Edmund Teixeira, another School Committee member, said he supported the new system, but decided to vote against it because it had become too much of a distraction.
‘‘We have a lot more important things on the table,’’ he said.
Biometrics, the science of using physical and behavioral traits to verify someone’s identity, has become increasingly common at school systems, airports, and elsewhere. Linda Peterson, a food service director in Nantucket, said the island’s schools started using finger-scan technology two years ago to allow students to pay for breakfast or lunch. Peterson said they ordered the system to speed up the lunch lines, but parents use it to monitor account balances and their children’s eating habits.
‘‘I’m absolutely happy with it,’’ Peterson said.
Civil libertarians argued the technology could be used in ways that could hurt students. They cited how retail stores have had customer data compromised.
‘‘Again and again today, through security breaches such as the massive loss of consumer data at the TJX companies, we see the dangers of identity theft,’’ Carol Rose, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts, said in a statement yesterday. ‘‘We should carefully examine programs that could further erode people’s privacy.’’
Maria Sacchetti of the Globe staff contributed to this report. 