91a Follow up to a question on students’ mental health data being shared with Keene State College

Dear Brown and Ms. Phillips,

After reviewing the files that were sent per the 91-a, I remain unclear on where and who has access to the PII that was collected by Keene State BHII. It appears that 13 identifiers were collected through, and some using this list below:
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I am copying some of our New Hampshire Senators, House Education Committee members, and school board members on this email. I know that many of our elected officials are concerned about mental health PII being accessible or shared without the knowledge or consent by the student or their parents. Contrary to what was presented during much of the testimony on SB265, the Senators now know that mental health PII was shared with Keene State BHII without the knowledge or consent by the parents or students from Governor Wentworth, Hudson, Merrimack Valley, Raymond, Sanborn Regional, SAU34 and SAU35.

As far as I can tell, school counselors and social workers provided mental health data, including PII through the Quickbase software. Keene State/BHII officials were able to access all of this PII mental health data.

This has left a lot of unanswered questions.

I hope that someone will take the time to answer these questions so that these elected representatives will get some answers:
1) What happens to the PII mental health data ?
2) Does anyone outside Keene State/BHII have access to all or some of the PII data?
3) Is the PII shared with any government agency?
4) Does anyone or agency within the federal government have access to any of the PII that has been collected?
5) Does anyone or any agency within the state government have access to any of the PII?
6) Who and when does the PII get destroyed? How?
7) How will parents know if there is ever a data breach?
8) Why did BHII require mental health PII on the children in these schools?
9) Did anyone discuss the School Counselor’s Code of Ethics provision under “confidentiality” with the school counselors and social workers who were required to enter the mental health PII data into the Quickbooks database?
10) Were any school counselors reluctant or hesitant to violate their own code of ethics?

11) What are the 13 identifiers that were collected?

I am deeply disturbed that we had Ms. Phillips, School Counselors, and a representative from the New Hampshire Department of Education all confirmed that informed consent was part of this process during the public hearing to add public funding to the MTSS-B framework. We all know that this is not true. Not only is it not true, we now have what appears to be school counselors violating their own code of ethics.

Ed306.39 includes references “The ASCA National Model: A Foundation for School Counseling Program,” published by the American School Counselor Association (ASCA) in 2012 as referenced in Appendix II as an integral part of the total educational program.”

Under A.2. Confidentiality School counselors from the ASCA Ethical Standards, parents would believe that their child’s personal information would be kept private and require informed consent before sharing this information with BHII.

New Hampshire’s Mental Health Bill of Rights also says:
3) To have the information you disclose to your mental health provider kept confidential within the limits of state and federal law. Communications between mental health providers and clients are typically confidential, unless the law requires their disclosure. Mental health providers will inform you of the legal exceptions to confidentiality, and should such an exception arise, will share only such information as required by law.
N.H. Code Admin. R. Mhp 502.02The New Hampshire Constitution, Article 2-B includes a right to privacy:

An individual’s right to live free from governmental intrusion in private or personal information is natural, essential, and inherent.Someone needs to answer these questions. The public, and our elected representatives have a right to know what PII has been accessible to anyone besides the school counselor or social worker.
Sincerely, Ann Marie Banfield

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