PRIVACY STATEMENT
Parkland College (hereafter referred to as “PC”, “the college, “we”, “our”) values and protects the privacy of its students, faculty, staff, and community visitors. This Privacy Statement outlines the standards and procedures adopted by the college to ensure this privacy. The college adheres to legal requirements prescribed by relevant international, federal, and state statutes.
This Privacy Statement applies primarily to our collection, use, and storage of your personal information (also known as personally identifiable information or PII) when you interact with the College in one or more of the following ways:
- Visit the college website at www.parkland.edu (hereafter the “Site”) and its related webpages;
- Visit the college student portal typically referred to as Connect at connect.parkland.edu;
- Correspond with the college or participate in online or offline activities and events;
- Complete an application for admission on our website; and/or
- Interact with third party vendors (such as standardized testing companies and online instructional services).
This Privacy Statement applies to information received and collected through the above mentioned ways. Privacy of your student educational records is covered separately under Policy 8.08 Release of Information About Students. A summary of student privacy rights under the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) can be found here.
The College reserves the right to modify this Privacy Statement as needed.
Information We Collect
1. Personally Identifiable Information
The College collects information you provide when you apply for admission, register for campus visits or events, apply for employment, donate to the College Foundation, or interact with any of the College’s sites and services. This information may include some or more of the following:
- Contact Information: You provide us with this information through the Site, the Inquiry Form, or mail such as your first and last name, email address, mailing address, phone number, and credit card information.
- Sensitive information: In the course of applying for admission, you provide information that may be potentially sensitive such as your country of birth and/or citizenship, race, gender, and social security number.
- Financial information: When using College services for financial transactions, you provide information pertinent for payment including contact information, bank accounts, and credit card information. PC does not store full credit or debit card numbers.
- Feedback and correspondence: When you correspond with us to ask questions or provide feedback either on the website, through emails, or surveys, you provide essential contact information
2. Website Traffic Data
The College automatically collects data on you whenever you access on our site. This data may include but is not limited to your Internet Protocol (IP) address, type of browser used, Internet Service Provider (ISP), date/time stamp of your access, referring or exit web pages, and the number of clicks you used.
The College may use cookies for some of these collection functions. For more information about cookies, see Use of Cookies below.
Typically, personal information of this kind is grouped together and referred to as aggregate data and is collected for the analysis of website effectiveness. Such data is not used to identify a particular individual.
How We Use Your Personal Information
The College uses the personal information you provide for the purposes stated when the information was requested. The primary ways we use personal information include the following:
- For the delivery of services consistent with the mission of the college
- For institutional research and state or federal mandated reporting
- For the protection of services and security of your information
- For direct marketing purposes
- For website improvement
- For software maintenance and upgrades
- For legal or law enforcement purposes
- The College will respond to law enforcement requests for personal information as required by applicable law, court order, or governmental regulations.
- For accessibility and other usability purposes
- The College will use individual user data such as browser type and version, screen size, and color depth to make our Site accessible to a widely varying audience. The College’s web team monitors search terms entered by users into the College’s search engine to improve the Site. We do not track search terms back to any individual user.
The personal data you provide is used by the College to provide effective services to you as part of its educational and training mission. Such services include but are not limited to admission processes; academic purposes (academic advising; class registration; entry into learning management system); instructional and learning activities; billing and financial aid; co-curricular and extracurricular activities; information technology services; communication; legal purposes; and other administrative services.
Personal data for these purposes are used in aggregate form. The information used will not identify a specific individual.
The College will retain your personal information to ensure the safety and security of our information technology services. It uses the information to identify accounts and associated activity and monitor services for malicious or fraudulent activity.
Your personal information collected while you interact with the College through its Site will be used only for marketing purposes as it relates to the College and its programs. As you browse our website, advertising cookies will be placed on your computer so that we can understand your interests. Our digital advertising partner then enables us to present you with retargeting advertising on other sites based on your previous interaction with the College’s website. We may also share your information with our digital advertising partners, who have agreed to protect the confidentiality of the data, to gather additional information such as name, address, social media handle, and email address, to use for direct marketing about the College.
For more information about cookies, see Use of Cookies below.
The College will provide third parties, such as Google Analytics, with statistical information about Site users to monitor and analyze our Site traffic and usage patterns with the objective of understanding user interest and improving your user experience.
Information may be accessed by or transferred to third parties, including but not limited to contractors working with the enterprise resource planning (ERP) software (currently Ellucian Colleague) or records imaging systems, who are contractually bound to abide by our privacy policy.
The Use of Cookies
Some parts of our site use cookies and other technologies to collect this information about your general internet usage. Cookies are small text files of information on your computer’s browser created to store information about your “sessions” on the College’s website. A “session” refers to the time you spend on our website. Cookies have the following functions to improve Site navigation and your overall web experience:
- To carry data about a current session at the Site from one webpage to the next webpage;
- To identify your previous session; and
- To collect data about your current session to evaluate and enhance the usefulness of the Site to you.
You should know that you have the right and ability to decline cookies. You can do so by going to Settings/Privacy and Security on your browser where you can opt to disable the cookies settings. You should understand that declining cookies may render you unable to access particular parts of our Site.
Commitment to Data Security
Parkland College uses reasonable methods consistent with industry best practices to prevent unauthorized access or disclosure, maintain data accuracy, and ensure the appropriate use of your personal information. The academic and financial information stored about each student is secured and managed in compliance with all state and federal laws, including but not limited to the Family Educational Rights to Privacy Act (FERPA) and the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (GLBA). Parkland College will never sell personal information about any employee, student, or community visitor to any third party.
Third Party Links
We may include third party services or product through our online platforms. Third party sites have separate and independent privacy policies. By accessing third-party websites through our Site using the hyperlinks we provide, you consent to those websites’ terms and privacy policies. We have no responsibility or liability for their policies, contents, or activities as we have no control over them. Nonetheless, we seek to protect the integrity of our Site and welcome any feedback regarding these sites from you.
The Privacy of Children
In compliance with the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act of 1998, our Site is not intended for anyone under the age of 13 to create an account, register for classes, or pay for classes. Users under age 13 may not submit or post any information, including PII, on our Site. By using our site, you affirm that you are at least 13 years of age. We are not liable for any damages that may result from a user’s misrepresentation of age. Only parents or guardians may provide information about their child under the age of 13 when registering their child to participate in activities sponsored by the College.
Consent
By visiting the Parkland College’s website and online resources, you accept the College practices pertaining to its collection, storage, and use of your PII as described above.
How to Contact Us
If you have any questions regarding this Privacy Statement or the measures taken by the College to protect your privacy, please contact the office of the Vice President for Student Services at VPSS@parkland.edu or by phone 217/351-2551.