I went to the hearing today on SB333. It lasted about 1 hour. Sen O'Hearn, prime sponsor, spoke for the measure. She indicated she was open to an amendment to ensure that home educated students were not put into the database, but she also wanted the amendment written so that parents who wished their home educated children to take the state assessment test could do so, as the reporting of the results will be done via the Universal Student Identifier (if this passes). There were also four DOE employees present to answer questions about their vision for the database.
Two surprise speakers, Claire Ebel of the NH Civil Liberties Union and Rep Neil Kurk, Chmn of the House Finance Committee (a very powerful position) both spoke against the creation of such an ID. Claire was against the idea totally; Neil wanted to make sure that the personally identifying information was only linked to the Universal Student Identifier at the local level, and never at the state level. Also, Rep Balboni had questions about the security measures used to ensure the privacy of the information.
A subcommittee of 5 was formed to study the bill, and will be meeting in early April. The question was posed, does the state risk losing the money if implementation is delayed for a year, and the answer was, "Probably not".