WHAT IS FERPA?

The Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act ("FERPA") is a federal law that gives students in higher education various rights with respect to their education records. One of your rights under FERPA relates to the confidentiality of information contained in your education records. As a general rule, Rutgers may not disclose "personally identifiable information" from your education records to anyone outside of the University without your prior written consent. There are exceptions to this general rule; one of them relates to "directory information." Rutgers may disclose (release directory information) about you without your prior consent provided Rutgers does the following:

• informs you what we define as directory information, and
• provides you the opportunity to request that directory information not be disclosed.

Directory Information at Rutgers Includes:

Disclosure of Directory Information at Rutgers:

The most common ways in which Rutgers discloses your directory information are:

• Rutgers Online Directory. The Rutgers Online Directory is a database of Rutgers students, faculty and staff that is available through the Rutgers homepage (http://www.rutgers.edu) and accessible worldwide via the Internet.
• Verifications Division – University Registrar. The Verifications Division of the University Registrar confirms to prospective employers, credit agencies, educational institutions and others that you are enrolled at Rutgers. This usually occurs when you have filed a job, school or credit application and the recipient needs to verify information on the application.

Preventing Disclosure of Your Directory Information at Rutgers:

To prevent Rutgers from disclosing your directory information, you should do the following:

• Rutgers Online Directory. You control the information that appears in the Rutgers Online Directory. Visit the Directory on the Rutgers homepage (http://www.rutgers.edu) and follow the instructions. You may display or hide any of the information in your listing and/or update certain information. You can make changes to your listing as often as you wish. Hiding information on the Rutgers Online Directory means that the information you hide cannot be seen by the public; however, all your information is still available to designated Rutgers officials for internal use. Hiding information on the Rutgers Online Directory also does not limit other disclosures of your Directory Information (e.g. disclosures by the Verifications Division of the Registrar to potential employers).
• All Other Disclosures. To keep your directory information completely confidential, except for internal Rutgers use, please complete all the information below and return this form to the Verifications Division of the Office of the Registrar at the appropriate address. Submitting this form will make your directory information confidential until you make a written request to the Office of the Registrar to lift this restriction. Please be advised that requesting full confidentiality of your Directory Information will make this information unavailable to prospective employers, insurance companies, and others to whom you may want this information known or verified. Thus it is recommended that students carefully consider whether personal privacy concerns outweigh the potential inconvenience of having directory information withheld. Mail your form to:

RUID Student Number (9-digits):  ____________________________________

Signature:  _______________________________________________________

Date:  ____________________________________________________________

For questions about your directory information, this form, and FERPA, please contact the Office of Compliance
and Student Policy Concerns at (732)932-7109, or email them at: www.rci.rutgers.edu/~polcomp

Updated: January 10, 2006