Student Refusing RFID Badge Now Fights Expulsion Order

BeatTheChip writes "Lawyers representing Andrea Hernandez, a science and engineering student at John Jay High School, are fighting an expulsion notice issued a week ago for refusing to wear a Smart ID badge. To represent her, lawyers filed a preliminary court injunction, seeking legal restraints on the school. She maintains stance of refusal to wear any badge containing an RFID tag for reasons of basic privacy and conflicts with her belief system. The controversial decision for her school to adopt the NFC badges is part of the Student Locator Project, tracking attendance. Local schools started issuing the lanyard badges this fall despite parental outcry at NISD school board meetings."

Put badge in microwave for 10 seconds.

[feepness]

Wear it all day long.

RFID = The Mark of Beast?

[s1d3track3D]

Funny, my initial reaction was, "great, a young engineering student standing up for her 1st and 4th amendment rights.", then I saw her primary reason,...

For many Christian families, including the Hernandez’, the mandatory policy is eerily close to the predictions of Revelations 13: 16-18, which warns of the Mark of the Beast:
16 He causes all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hand or on their foreheads,
17 and that no one may buy or sell except one who has the mark or[a] the name of the beast, or the number of his name.
18 Here is wisdom. Let him who has understanding calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man: His number is 666. (New King James Version)

Re:Get homeshcooled

[ThatsMyNick]

Public school not public place. Public school as in funded by taxes. Or were you just trolling?

odd claims about RFID

[YesIAmAScript]

'The controversial ID badge includes the photo and name of each student, a barcode tied to the student’s social security number, as well as an RFID chip which pinpoints the exact location of the individual student, including after hours and when the student leaves campus.'

RFID chips don't work that way. They don't know their location. They seem to be worried that the RFID will be read by someone else when the student is off campus. All the student has to do is remove the RFID chip when off campus.

NFC?

[chromas]

Student Refusing RFID Badge

refusal to wear any badge containing an RFID tag

school to adopt the NFC badges

One of these things is not like the other.

School offered to let her wear a disabled ID

[Anonymous Coward]

The school letter says that they offered her the opportunity to wear an ID with the "battery and chip removed" on two occasions and she refused.

So this isn't about RFID, it's about wearing ID.

Re:Put badge in microwave for 10 seconds.

[kf6auf]

Actually, the school offerred to give her one without a chip or battery. She still refused so I'm guessing she wouldn't be satisfied with the microwave trick.

Re:Put badge in microwave for 10 seconds.

[TubeSteak]

Read the letter linked from infowars:
http://static.infowars.com/2012/11/i/general/Hernandez_RFID-ID-john_jay_letter.jpg [infowars.com]

"In the event that you change your stance on wearing the ID with the battery and chip removed as has been offered to you on two occasions, we will be more than willing to rescind this withdrawal notice."

That seems reasonable, except for the fact that she was also told her original pre-RFID card would be valid for all 4 years she was enrolled at the school.

Everything aside, the zero tolerance policies that most school administrators (officially or unofficially) adopt is an injustice all its own.

RTFA

[jklovanc]

She was offered a badge without an RFID chip in it. She refuses to wear a badge of any sort.

Re:Get homeshcooled

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh little Billy Gates, stop lying on Slashdot and go invent the Timmy.

RFID vs NFC

[jac89]

I think it is important to make a distinction between RFID and NFC. NFC works only at very short ranges (a cm at most). So basically is only useful for tapping your card on a reader. This has a very different implication to RFID which can be scanned from several feet away, allowing much more ubiquitous monitoring without the input of the person being monitored.

Infowars?

[Anubis350]

Whether this is an issue or not, linking to infowars is irresponsible of slashdot. Inforwars is a conspiracy nutjob site, not a credible or trustworthy news source. Find a better source or don't post BeatTheChip

Re:RTFA

[silviuc]

Wearing a badge was actually required for high-school students in my country 20 years ago when we had a communist party ruling the country. It's funny how American democracy looks more and more like the "democracy" the communist party was preaching back then.

Re:Put badge in microwave for 10 seconds.

[Spamalope]

Read the letter linked from infowars:

"In the event that you change your stance on wearing the ID with the battery and chip removed as has been offered to you on two occasions, we will be more than willing to rescind this withdrawal notice."

"In response to public outcry and pressure from rights groups, the school has offered to remove the battery and chip, but wouldn’t budge on mandating the ID. Their offer would also require the Hernandez family to end their criticism and agree to comply with and even tout the policy,"

On the condition that her and her father say the sh*t sandwich tastes great and everyone should try some. It seems you left the most important part out.

Re:RTFA

[thereitis]

"Due to her persistent refusal, the school’s administration finally offered Andrea a deal; she would comply with the project by wearing a program badge with the chip removed."

But it's not quite that simple:

“[A]s part of the accommodation my daughter and I would have to agree to stop criticizing the program and publicly support it. I told [the Deputy Superintendent] that was unacceptable because it would imply an endorsement of the district’s policy and my daughter and I should not have to give up our constitutional rights to speak out against a program that we feel is wrong.”

Re:RFID = The Mark of Beast?

[Anonymous Coward]

It is a convoluted way of saying that the number 666 (or 616 in other sources) can be interpreted as a code for the name of a specific person - with most scholars seemingly agreeing that it encoded the name of the Roman Emperor Nero.
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Number_of_the_Beast for details.

Re:Put badge in microwave for 10 seconds.

[Electricity Likes Me]

Why not skip school and have a friend carry her ID around... is that so hard for teachers to actually take attendance? Social problems CANNOT be solved with technology solutions... such as voting machines.

Which is what's going to happen. Wasn't this tried and immediately the kids had a system where one kid would swipe your card for you for $5?

Re:Put badge in microwave for 10 seconds.

[Fished]

The school added lots of requirements to that, including that she visibly display the badge to show people that she had been brought into line, and that her parents publicly support the badge program.

Talk about Gestapo tactics ...

Re:Put badge in microwave for 10 seconds.

[Hatta]

No, actually it takes centuries. e.g. American Indians are able to legally collect and consume peyote as part of religious ceremonies, because they've been doing it for centuries. No matter how sincere or deeply felt your religious beliefs, they're not going to let you do the same.