FERPA Agreement Form
Protecting Student Privacy Agreement
Dear Canvas Class Observer,
Thank you for your interest in helping to promote student success at Santiago Canyon
College. Before we provide you access to a Canvas Class, we need to orient you to
our important student privacy responsibilities.
When accessing a class on Canvas you will be provided with some protected and private
student data. The Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) (20 U.S.C. § 1232g;
34 CFR Part 99) is a Federal law that protects the privacy of student education records.
The law applies to all schools that receive funds under an applicable program of the
U.S. Department of Education.
Santiago Canyon College must obtain permission from the student in order to release
any information from the student's education record. However, FERPA allows schools
to disclose some records, without consent, to school officials with legitimate educational
interest.
You are being designated as a school official with legitimate educational interest in
an active section(s) at SCC. If you agree to the following terms, you will be provided
with Observer Access within Canvas, which provides you with the following student
records and course information.
Observers can
- View and read announcements
- View assignments index page
- View the calendar
- Join conferences, if invited
- Join collaborations, if invited
- View personal inbox
- Send conversation messages to instructor and specific student(s) they are observing, if any
- View the dashboard
- View and read discussions
- View files unless they are locked
- View modules and see due dates and point values
- View pages and contribute if the instructor enables the Anyone can edit it setting
- View profile pictures, if available
- View syllabus
- View outcomes
- View quizzes index page
Directory information is not protected information. Any other student information
is protected by FERPA. However, we are only permitted to disclose this information
if we have a legitimate need for doing so, such as on a sports roster. Directory information
is listed below (noted in BP 5040, AR5040 and AR 5045):
- student's name,
- city of residence,
- major field of study,
- participation in officially recognized activities and sports, weight, height, and age if a member of an athletic team
- dates of attendance
- degrees and awards received, and
- most recent previous educational institution or agency attended by the student
All other student data is private and protected through FERPA.
The Observer Role
Observers can view course data but cannot participate in all Canvas areas. Observers
may be added to a course to observe course data. For instance, instructors sometimes
invite guests to join their courses, such as for a web conference. Enrolling the guest
with an observer role allows access to the course without being able to affect any
course data or participation.
Observers can be set up with different levels of access. Observers can be linked to
a single student or multiple students, providing the observer with additional student
data, such as grades. It this level of access is needed, please contact the Distance
Education Department for guidance.
Observer Access Does Not Include the Following
- Comment on announcements or discussions
- Submit assignments or quizzes
- View course rosters
- Send conversation messages to students in the course they are not observing
- View locked files or folders
- Join groups
- View unpublished courses
- Access the Chat tool
- Reserve appointment slots in the Scheduler
- View grade audit trail
Observer Limitations
- Observers can view module content locked by prerequisites or requirements, as module progression is not measured for observers.
- Observers can view assignments even if the student they are observing has not completed them unless the assignments are locked.
- Each instructor can customize the links in the Course Navigation and limit the number of features that students and observers can see. Observers may or may not see links to certain features.
Below, you will be presented with a Canvas Quiz. In this quiz, you will be asked if
you agree to protect the student data to which you are being provided. You will also
be asked to agree that the data being provided to you will not be used by you in any
way that would violate our FERPA obligation, policies, and requirements.
If you have any questions about FERPA or in how you may use student data, please contact
the Associate Dean of Admissions & Records for guidance.