Privacy Rights of Students in Education Records

In order to ensure the compliance with the federal Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act of 1974 (FERPA), the Registrar's Office provides these guidelines relating to student academic records.

These guidelines do not necessarily apply to other related areas such as Student Affairs, Health Services, Financial Aid, Student Accounts, Admissions, Human Resources, etc. Specific questions about information maintained by these areas should be addressed to the appropriate department. You may also refer to the section on Privacy Rights on page 36 of the 2001-2003 University Catalog.

Information Access for Campus Employees: Essentially, the campus is authorized to provide access to student records (or the information therein) to campus officials and employees who have a legitimate educational interest in such access. These persons are those who have responsibilities in connection with the campus' academic, administrative or service functions and have reason for using student records connected with their campus or other related academic responsibilities. Staff and faculty that utilize STARRS Singularity or data from STARRS Singularity are considered campus officials/employees who have a legitimate educational need and therefore individual student authorization is not required to access information from records. Those staff/faculty not having a legitimate educational need and the general public are entitled only to data considered to be Public or Directory Information.

Public or Directory Information: This is information that the campus is authorized to release to anyone, inside or outside the University, without prior approval of the student. However, circumstances exist in which directory information may not be released. Those exceptions are as follows:

• when a student has filed a privacy request with The Registrar's Office
• when you are unsure about the nature or purpose of the request. (The Privacy Act does not require the release of Directory Information; it only specifies what may be released under normal circumstances.)

The Registrar's Office is the only office authorized to issue, in writing, certification/verification of Academic Records.  There are several Directory items that are acceptable to certify/verify (dates of attendance; degree confirmation) if the confidentiality flag is not present.  Please note it is not your role to confirm certification and/or verification.  If you are comfortable in releasing Directory Information, please be exceptionally careful not to certify/verify any information on a confidential student record or any information that requires written permission to be released.  Written permission to release non-directory information must be on file in the Registrar's Office and can only be released by that office.

Questions regarding Privacy of Student Records should be addressed to Maria L. Martinez at mlmartinez@csupomona.edu.