About
FERPA and student privacy
The Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (20 U.S.C. § 1232g; 34 CFR Part 99) is the federal law governing the privacy of student education records. It applies to every educational agency and institution that receives funding under a program administered by the U.S. Department of Education. This self-paced training is provided by the University of Arizona College of Education. Questions: tmalan@arizona.edu.
This training explains FERPA as it applies to ordinary practice. It is not legal advice about any specific situation — for that, consult your institution's registrar, privacy officer, or general counsel.
Learning objectives
At the conclusion of this course, participants will be able to:
- Identify what FERPA protects and which institutions are bound by it.
- Distinguish an education record from records FERPA excludes, such as sole-possession notes and law-enforcement unit records.
- Explain directory information and the effect of a student's opt-out.
- Apply the school-official exception and the standard of legitimate educational interest.
- Recognise the disclosures FERPA permits without consent, and the conditions attached to each.
- Describe the rights held by parents and by eligible students, and how those rights transfer.
- Respond appropriately when an education record is disclosed in error.
Completion rule
A certificate is issued when every section has been worked through, every knowledge check passed, every activity completed, and the post-test passed at 80% or higher. Knowledge checks and the post-test may be retaken as many times as needed.
Accessibility
We target WCAG 2.2 AA. Content is keyboard-operable and quizzes use accessible form controls with screen-reader announcements on errors. Please report issues to tmalan@arizona.edu.
Privacy & data
We store only what's necessary to issue your certificate: your name, email, affiliation, section progress, quiz attempts, and completion timestamp. We do not use third-party analytics. Certificate files are served through authenticated routes and are not publicly indexed. A training about education records should hold its own to the same standard — see Privacy and your data.