The geographical distance to educational facilities is a relevant information in the field of educational research. However, information on personal geo-coordinates is considered sensitive data and often must be deleted after the end of the project. Potential distance calculations to answer relevant research questions are therefore only possible for a limited period of time. In this paper we use a new method to calculate the approximate distances between anonymized spatial data using the coordinates of BiLO respondents’ places of residence and the addresses of educational institutions. Overlapping sets of grid points (ISGP) were used to approximate these distances. The method is a new procedure to guarantee data privacy when processing georeferenced data sets. The anonymized coordinates of the BiLO respondents can be used for approximate distance calculations in future studies.