Data Privacy Policy
As part of our mission, Project Tomorrow conducts research that involves collecting information from millions of individuals, chiefly from students, parents and educators. The largest data collection effort is our annual Speak Up Research Initiative (Speak Up), which began in 2003. This Data Privacy Policy covers all of Speak Up as well as our other contracted research projects that involve online data collection (“Our Research”).
We understand concerns of parents and administrators about privacy, so we have created this Student Data Privacy Policy to address data collected by individuals under age 18.
1. Information Collection
Speak Up: Information Provided During Speak Up Registration Process
All of the data collected as part of the Speak Up Research Initiative is anonymous and confidential. And, when it comes to students, we are very intentional about not collecting any identifying information, and we do not share any individual Speak Up responses with anyone.
When an adult representative at a school or district registers that organization to participate in Speak Up, we collect basic contact information including the school/district representative’s name, email address, school and district name, city, state, zip and an administrative password to view data results. They may also optionally enter additional participation information to help the Speak Up Team manage the Speak Up process.
In the event an authorized individual wants access to their district or school’s data, but does not want to provide the contact information or email, we will register the organization with the contact name of Project Tomorrow and email address speakup@tomorrow.org. We will then assign that contact a randomized password so they can access when it becomes available.
Our registration process also obtains public school and district demographic data from the Common Core of Data database published by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) (www.nces.ed.gov). This information includes enrollment, ethnicity, free and reduced lunch indicators (which are a measure of school poverty) and a geographic classification for urban, rural or suburban.
It is the responsibility of the participating schools and districts to recruit their specific stakeholders to participate in Speak Up. They may choose to promote participation through a variety of mechanisms, including but not limited to, flyers, emails, blogs, websites or school portals.
Information Provided When You Subscribe to Our Mailing Lists
If you subscribe to our mailing list, we collect your name and email address. You may also optionally enter additional contact information such as your title and phone number, the name of your organization, address, city, state and zip.
Speak Up: Information Provided When Participating in Speak Up
Aggregated data results are available, online, free-of-charge, via a password-protected site to participating schools and districts. To ensure that an individual’s responses are matched to the appropriate participating school, participants are required to enter the name of their school and the state. Those that select the Parent or Community Member options are the only participants who may participate without entering a state or specific school name.
We do not collect any other personal identifying information from a Speak Up participant. All responses are collected anonymously and are confidential. We do not have any identifying characteristics that can link a set of responses to a specific respondent. We cannot and will not share with the school or district the IP address of any individual taking the online survey since we do not collect full complete IP addresses other than as is strictly technically necessary.
Speak Up: Automatically Collected Information
During the Speak Up survey process, we gather certain information automatically and store it in log files. This information includes “masked” internet protocol (IP) addresses (last few digits are scrambled), date/time stamp, and survey pages completed. We use this information to keep track of the survey status. Additionally, we use temporary “cookies” to track the movement through the survey; these “cookies” expire within a couple of hours and are deleted when the survey is finished. We do not combine any data with any other information for the purposes of identifying individuals.
In addition, schools also use routers which mask the desktop IP further limiting the ability to track web activity to an individual.
Like most websites, we automatically collect certain types of usage information when you visit any of our websites. This information is typically collected through cookies, log files, web beacons, and similar tracking technology (collectively, “cookies”). These cookies collect information about how you use the Website (e.g., the pages you view, the links you click, and other actions you take on the Website), information about your browser and online usage patterns (e.g., Internet Protocol (“IP”) address, browser type, browser language, referring / exit pages and URLs, pages viewed, whether you opened an email, links clicked), and information about the device(s) you use to access the Website (e.g., mobile device identifier, mobile carrier, device type, model and manufacturer, mobile device operating system brand and model, and, depending on your mobile device settings, your geographical location data at the city, state, or country level ).
Our analytics tools do not collect more than a general location (at most, city-level), and are set to “IP Anonymization.” In addition, we may also use clear gifs in HTML-based emails to track which emails are opened and which links are clicked by recipients. The information allows for more accurate reporting and improvement of the Website. We may also collect analytics data, or use third-party analytics tools, to help us measure traffic and usage trends for the Website. Although we do our best to honor the privacy preferences of our visitors, we are not able to respond to Do Not Track signals from your browser at this time.
We use or may use the data collected through cookies, log files, device identifiers, and clear gifs information to: (a) remember information so that you do not have to re-enter it on subsequent visits; (b) to provide and monitor the effectiveness of our website; (c) monitor aggregate metrics such as total number of visitors, traffic, and usage on our website and our Website; (d) diagnose or fix technology problems; and (e) otherwise plan for and enhance our website.
We do not combine data points for the purposes of identifying, profiling, or targeting any individuals, including and especially students.
Other Project Tomorrow Research: Information Provided as Part of Contracted Research (not Speak Up)
Project Tomorrow conducts additional research for and with schools and districts where we may access, use and analyze student data with the goal of improving student learning outcomes. During the course of this work, we may have access to individual student data. “Individual student data” is any information that is directly related to an identifiable current or former student that is maintained by a school, school district, or related entity or organization, or by us. Individual student data may include “educational records” as defined in the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (“FERPA”). We consider individual student data to be highly confidential.
Our collection and use of this data provided by schools through our service is governed by our contracts with the schools and by federal and state law.
Project Tomorrow may have access to student data only as requested by the school as needed to perform contracted research. The type of student data we collect will depend on how the particular contract, but could include information relating to the individual student and the student’s educational record, such as a name, student ID numbers, grades, and/or coursework. In many instances, we receive only de-identified or aggregate information about students from a school, such that we would not be able to identify an individual student. From time to time, we may collect information from other sources, including from non-school sources or from the students themselves. If we combine or associate information from other sources with student data we collect through our research, we will treat the combined information as individual student data under our policies and agreements, including under this Privacy Policy. Please talk to your school if you have questions about the type of personal information the school provides to Project Tomorrow.
2. Information Use
In addition to the uses of your information described elsewhere in this privacy policy, we may also use your information in one or more of the following ways. We will not use or share your contact information in ways unrelated to those described in this privacy policy without your permission.
Speak Up: Use of Speak Up Questions and Results
Speak Up questions, responses and results are kept in strict confidence by us. We aggregate the Speak Up questions and responses into national, state, district and school level totals.
Once submitted, responses are is automatically included in this aggregation process. Once submitted, we do not provide an opportunity to opt-out or delete individual responses.
Once the Speak Up open period is closed and the results are aggregated, participating schools and districts have the ability to view their aggregated data results with national benchmarks online free of charge. They may use this information for their own analysis purposes.
Speak Up: Statistical Analyses
Project Tomorrow reserves the right to perform statistical analyses of the Speak Up data based on school demographic and participant supplied demographic information. For example, we may analyze the Speak Up responses based on any one of these optionally entered fields: grade, gender, ethnicity, years of experience, educational attainment, or income. Only aggregated data results are shared.
Communications from Project Tomorrow
We will use your contact information to communicate with you and provide you with transactional messages in response to your inquiries, to provide you with information you request, and to manage your Speak Up participation. For example, when you register for Speak Up you will receive a short welcome email.
We will send you weekly participation emails during the Speak Up open period (unless you opt-out). We may use your information to contact you when Speak Up reports and presentations are available, or to let you know about opportunities that may be of interest to you. You may opt out of receiving such communications from us at any time (but not the transactional emails described in the paragraphs above) by following the instructions to unsubscribe at the end of each promotional email or by directly contacting us via email.
Other Project Tomorrow Research: Use of Student Data (not Speak Up)
Aside from Speak Up, all individual student data that we have access to, if any, is owned and controlled by the schools. We use such data to provide contracted services and for other limited purposes permitted by our agreements with the schools. We will never use student data for marketing purposes or to engage in targeted advertising.
3. Sharing Information with Third Parties
Speak Up: State Departments of Education and Ministries of Education
Project Tomorrow works with State Departments of Education and Ministries of Education to help their specific districts (jurisdictions) and schools utilize the Speak Up survey process and results. Aggregated, non-personal, national, state (or provincial) or district data results are made available to these participating state and provincial education agencies.
Speak Up: Other Third Parties
Project Tomorrow may disclose Speak Up questions and national aggregated responses anonymously to organizations and individuals requesting access to our national findings.
Other Project Tomorrow Research: Data Sharing
We may share student data as needed to perform contracted research and/or at the direction of a school and as authorized by our contract with the school. We may share data with our trusted vendors, third party service providers and other individuals who perform services on our behalf, but only if such providers have a need to access such information for the purpose of carrying out their work for us and do so under strict confidentiality and data security terms.
We may be required to share information with law enforcement or other third parties when compelled to do so by court order or other legal process, to comply with statutes or regulations.
4. Opting Out of Communications from Project Tomorrow
Any Speak Up contact may opt out of our email promotion and participation lists. You can follow the unsubscribe instructions included in each promotional e-mail, change your participation email status to opt-out or send us an email at speakup@tomorrow.org and request to be removed from our mailing list.
5. Accessing, Changing or Deleting Your Information
We endeavor to ensure that your contact information is accurate by collecting it directly from you and providing you with the ability to update it. If your contact information changes, or if you no longer desire to serve as the primary Speak Up contact person or receive information from us regarding Speak Up, you may request us to correct, update, or remove your information from our records by emailing us at speakup@tomorrow.org.
We will endeavor to fulfill requests to delete your contact information unless such information is required to be retained by law or for legitimate business purposes (such as storage in backup media created as part of our routine system backup procedures). We will respond to your request for access, amendment, or deletion within 30 days.
The Data Privacy Policy was last updated on September 24, 2018. See our Website Privacy Policy for more related to www.tomorrow.org.
