Consumer

Documents Of Dallas Students Found In Dumpster

DALLAS (CBS 11 News) ― The personal information of some North Texas students -- including social security numbers, home addresses, and phone numbers -- were recently found in a dumpster where anyone could steal the documents.

The 'treasure trove' of information was sitting in a recycling bin and officials with the Dallas Independent School District must now find out how it got there.

Hundreds of documents belonging to Dallas schoolchildren were found in a recycling bin, sitting behind the Meadow View Church of Christ in Mesquite.

Dennis Sebring says he was dumping newspapers, when he noticed two large boxes with completed applications to attend the career development center at Skyline High School.

In addition to having confidential data on test scores, the applications included identifying information on students and their parents. The paperwork dates back four to six years.

Then, later Friday night, more DISD records from Skyline High School were discovered in the road by Dallas resident Darryl Henderson. He said that he found an envelope on Thursday that was filled with student records. The discovery came while he was driving into a shopping center in east Dallas.

According to Henderson, the records -- hundreds of pages listing student names and classes that they were potentially failing in September 2006 -- were packaged with a memo from a school official. The memo stated that the records are meant to be "confidential."

Henderson called CBS 11 News after seeing an initial report about the records.

Now the big question – How did it get to a recycling bin in Mesquite? Dallas school district officials say the dumping of the papers is a serious violation of district policy.

State regulations require school district's to retain student records up to seven years. According to policy discarded materials are to be shredded.

"We work very hard to make sure records are destroyed in a secure manner. These were not," DISD Records Manager Christopher Stone told CBS 11 News. "I cannot speak to why they're here, but we'll go back to the campus and try to figure out what's going on there."

A 2003/2004 middle school application was found for Chelsey Hancock. The now 18-year-old says she is shocked and disappointed that the information was disposed of so carelessly. The girl's mother says she would have hoped to have been notified. "My daughter could be victimized in all of this," Harriet Hancock said. "Someone could have used her social security number illegally and no one would have been of the wiser."

DISD officials say they are investigating if the documents showed have been disposed of and why that wasn't done properly.

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