PowerSchool data breach affects Jackson County schools

A data breach in the student information system that serves thousands of schools across the country is affecting families in all three Jackson County school districts to varying degrees, superintendents from the schools reported.

The Dec. 28 data breach at PowerSchool, which many school districts around the country utilize for storing student information, occurred through a customer support portal and exposed the personal information of millions of students, according to a PowerSchool representative.

Holton USD 336 superintendent Trevor Ashcraft and technology director Tom Sextro issued a statement on Thursday, Jan. 9 about the widespread data breach, which “violates our expectations for district vendors” as well as “board policy and Kansas law.”

Jackson Heights USD 335 superintendent Jim Howard and Royal Valley USD 337 superintendent Aaric Davis, whose school districts also utilize PowerSchool, also said they were notified of the data breach and were taking steps to address the situation.

“I think we are all in the same boat,” Supt. Davis said.

PowerSchool is used by school districts to store students’ information, such as grades, attendance and other data that can be checked by students’ parents, and school districts can use it to plan more personalized learning plans for students. The company’s Web site states that it serves more than 60 million students at 18,000 schools in the U.S.

Following the Dec. 28 data breach, PowerSchool representatives said their company has been contacting school districts, alerting them to the potential exposure of student and parent information and “holding webinars with districts that had been impacted to explain more of what happened.”

PowerSchool representatives said the breach involved the downloading of “a large amount of data about students, schools and families” by someone who allegedly demanded a so-far undisclosed amount of money to delete the data. The company said it paid the money and the data was deleted, and now PowerSchool is working with the Federal Bureau of Investigation on the matter.

For more on this and other stories, please log in to your holtonrecorder.net account and select “Jan. 15, 2025” under “E-Editions.”

The Holton Recorder

109 W. Fourth St.
Holton, KS 66436
Phone: 785-364-3141

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