The Bemus Point Central School Board of Education was briefed on the status of ongoing adjustments to cyber security and privacy in response to a recent New York State requirement.

At its Feb. 10 meeting, Michael Mansfield, Bemus Point superintendent, said the board was provided with a presentation by Bill Arthurs, Bemus Point technology and communications director, updating board members about the status of the district’s progress of adhering to the state’s requirement referred to as “ED 2D.”

On Jan. 13, the New York State Board of Regents adopted Part 121 of the Regulations of the Commissioner of Education to implement Education Law Section 2-d.

The law, drafted to protect student and staff private information from third-party software providers, has forced districts to re-negotiate with these companies that includes “a raft of contracts and paperwork for any software we use, essentially, that has student identifiable data,” Mansfield said.

“It’s like a lot of things,” Mansfield said of the new law. “I think the concept is good that you’re protecting students and staff identity data, but the implementation is what they call the unfunded mandate. There is no money to help us do this.”

Mansfield said companies providing free software, a method many teachers utilize, often ask the district to purchase its full product when school officials attempt to get the providers to agree to the state requirement.

Many of the software services that are used in Bemus Point are provided through Erie 2-BOCES, which handles the negotiations with the corresponding companies.

Additionally, the district hired a technician to maintain current school systems technology while Arthurs addresses the new mandate.

“It’s an expense,” Mansfield said. “I know there are districts that are struggling with that. That’s how we handled it.”

While districts are technically supposed to have completed the updating of third-party agreements, Mansfield said the state has shown leniency to schools making efforts to adopt the changes.

“As long as you’re showing progress then you’re fine,” Mansfield said.

In other news, Mansfield also presented early projections of the 2020-21 school budget to board members during the recent meeting.

Mansfield said the presentation was simply to show what school officials could “accurately predict right now.” He added that recent changes to state foundation aid has made it more difficult to project district numbers.

When the initial state aid projections were released in January, several area superintendents questioned categorical changes to how the numbers are being reported. The categories for BOCES; hardware and technology; and software, library and textbook are no longer listed as line items for 2020-21 reports, which Bret Apthorpe, Jamestown Public School superintendent, said were grouped into the foundation aid category.

“(Cuomo) has made it some what confusing to what we are actually getting,” Mansfield said, referring to foundation aid.