FERPA rights at BSC
Gary Lowell
Issue date: 10/29/09 Section: Opinion
The Family Education Rights and Privacy Act grants students who attend schools many different rights in regards to their education records. FERPA provides that any educational agency or institution may not receive federal funds if it has a policy or practice of releasing student educational records without the written consent of the student. There are some exceptions, deemed directory information, but these do not include grades and a student's transcript.
There are some people to whom non-directory educational records can be released without prior consent from a student. The only group of people in this category that could apply to staff members at BSC is school officials with a "legitimate educational interest." In addition to this, FERPA provides that a record must be kept in each student's education records which keeps track of all individuals who accessed the records who are not specified as being able to have education records without consent.
This summer I became aware of a policy of Bridgewater State College which I believed violated FERPA; I found out that all professors who advise students in addition to certain staff members have access to the education records of all students, not just the students they advise.
To learn more about the school's FERPA policy, I interviewed Irene Checkovich, Registrar. According to Checkovich, the Banner system, which houses student records, is designed in a way that all full-time professors who advise students and certain staff members are given access to records of all students. Checkovich said that the Banner system is all or nothing right now once access is approved.
According to Checkovich, this current system was requested by faculty, who wanted more access to student records for advising purposes. She also said that it is up to the faculty to use the information responsibly. Checkovich said that allowing all full-time faculty to view all student records "gives students the ability to work with a greater amount of faculty." In addition, Checkovich said that offices are given access to all student records if they have a legitimate need to know.
There are some people to whom non-directory educational records can be released without prior consent from a student. The only group of people in this category that could apply to staff members at BSC is school officials with a "legitimate educational interest." In addition to this, FERPA provides that a record must be kept in each student's education records which keeps track of all individuals who accessed the records who are not specified as being able to have education records without consent.
This summer I became aware of a policy of Bridgewater State College which I believed violated FERPA; I found out that all professors who advise students in addition to certain staff members have access to the education records of all students, not just the students they advise.
To learn more about the school's FERPA policy, I interviewed Irene Checkovich, Registrar. According to Checkovich, the Banner system, which houses student records, is designed in a way that all full-time professors who advise students and certain staff members are given access to records of all students. Checkovich said that the Banner system is all or nothing right now once access is approved.
According to Checkovich, this current system was requested by faculty, who wanted more access to student records for advising purposes. She also said that it is up to the faculty to use the information responsibly. Checkovich said that allowing all full-time faculty to view all student records "gives students the ability to work with a greater amount of faculty." In addition, Checkovich said that offices are given access to all student records if they have a legitimate need to know.
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