Privacy policy

This privacy statement discloses the privacy practices for Transforming High Schools, a website owned and operated by GreatSchools Inc. If you have questions or concerns about this privacy policy, you should contact us by emailing help@greatschools.org.

For the purposes of EU data protection laws (“Data Protection Law“), GreatSchools Inc. is data controller (i.e., the company who is responsible for, and controls the processing of, your personal data).

Information Collection and Use

GreatSchools Inc. collects information from our users at several different points on our website. GreatSchools Inc. is the sole owner of the information collected on this site (“GreatSchools“). We will not sell, share or rent this information to others in ways other than as disclosed in this statement.

We share aggregated demographic information with our partners and sponsors. This is not linked to any personally identifiable information.

We use third-party vendors to provide services on the website, such as sending email messages to subscribers. The information that a user submits on the site will be provided to our vendor so that we may send GreatSchools communications to users who have ‘opted in’ to receive them. We may share your email address with our partners to offer you programs and services we are jointly promoting. You may opt-out of these communications at any time. Please note, however, if such communications include a link to a vendor’s website or a co-branded partner page and you submit personal information to such vendor’s website or a co-branded partner page, then the privacy policies and practices of such vendor’s website or a co-branded partner page governs the use of your personal information.

We may release information provided by a user if a subpoena, order, or demand from a governmental agency or court requires disclosure. We may also release information provided by a user if GreatSchools in its sole discretion determines that release may assist in protecting the health, safety, or welfare of another. However, GreatSchools has no obligation to exercise such discretion.

Cookies

GreatSchools Inc. deposits cookies on users’ hard drives. A cookie is a piece of data stored on the user’s hard drive containing information about the user. By setting a cookie on our site, a user does not have to log in a password more than once and saves time while on our site. Users who reject the cookie may still use greatschools.org, but they may be limited in some areas of our site.

Cookies can also enable us to track and target the interests of our users to enhance their experience. Some of the information about how our users experience our site, such as page views and specific pages visited, is logged by a third-party marketing company on our behalf, using cookies and Web beacons. Web beacons help us understand information such as what browsers our users have so that we are able to develop our site to best support our users. We control how this data may and may not be used. If you do not want to help us learn how to improve our site, you can “opt out” here.

GreatSchools also works with third-party media measurement services that enable advertisers, publishers and agencies to view audience reports for websites. They use certain data, including your IP address and information from cookies they place on your computer, to aggregate Internet activity to produce these reports and analyses. For more information about Quantcast’s privacy policy, or to opt out of this service, please click here.

GreatSchools also uses Google Analytics to help analyze how visitors use our site. Google Analytics uses cookies to collect standard internet log information and visitor behavior information in an anonymous form. For more information on how Google collects and processes this data, please click here. To opt-out of this service, please click here.

GreatSchools also works with third-party companies to serve ads when you visit www.greatschools.org. These companies may use information (not including your name, address, email address or telephone number) about your visits to www.greatschools.org in order to provide advertisements on www.greatschools.org, other websites and other forms of media about goods and services that may be of interest to you. If you would like more information about this practice and to know your choices about not having this information used by these companies, please click here.

Legal basis for processing in the EU

In the EU, the purposes for which we process your personal data are:

1. the provision of personal data by you may be necessary for the performance of any contractual relationship we have with you;

2. where it is necessary for compliance with our legal obligations laid down by EU law;

3. where in our legitimate interests (provided these are not overridden by your interests and fundamental rights and freedoms – this includes our own legitimate interests) such as:

   1. to tailor our services to the user and improve our services generally;

   2. to communicate with users and respond to queries, complaints, and concerns, and for developing and improving our services; and

   3. for fraud prevention and detection.

For residents in the EU or Switzerland

If you are located in the EU or Switzerland, you have the following rights in respect of your personal data that we hold:

• Right of access. The right to obtain access to your personal data;

• Right to rectification. The right to obtain rectification of your personal data without undue delay where that personal data is inaccurate or incomplete;

• Right to erasure. The right to obtain the erasure of your personal data without undue delay in certain circumstances, such as where the personal data is no longer necessary in relation to the purposes for which it was collected or processed;

• Right to restriction. The right to obtain the restriction of the processing undertaken by us on your personal data in certain circumstances, such as where the accuracy of the personal data is contested by you, for a period enabling us to verify the accuracy of that personal data;

• Right to portability. The right to portability allows you to move, copy or transfer personal data easily from one organization to another; and

• Right to object. You have a right to object to processing based on legitimate interests and direct marketing.

If you wish to exercise one of these rights, please contact us using the contact details at the end of this Privacy Policy.

You also have the right to lodge a complaint to your local data protection authority. Further information about how to contact your local data protection authority is available at http://ec.europa.eu/justice/data-protection/bodies/authorities/index_en.htm.  

Log Files

We use IP addresses to analyze trends, administer the site, track users’ movement and gather broad demographic information for aggregate use. IP addresses are not linked to personally identifiable information.

Links

This website contains links to other sites. Please be aware that GreatSchools Inc. is not responsible for the privacy practices of these other sites. When users leave our site, we encourage them to be aware of and to read the privacy statements of each and every website that collects personally identifiable information. This privacy statement applies solely to information collected by this website.

Newsletters

If a user wishes to subscribe to our newsletter or other email services, we may ask for contact information such as name and email address. This information is used to contact the user about the services on our site for which they have expressed interest. It is optional for the user to provide demographic information (such as child’s grade level or ZIP code) but encouraged so that we can provide more personalized service.

From time to time, GreatSchools may email our newsletter subscribers a request to complete user surveys and/or events that we believe are of interest. This may include promotions from a related third-party sponsor.

Choice/Opt Out

Users who no longer wish to receive our newsletters or other communications can unsubscribe using the tools provided in every email message we send or from the subscription management page.

User Surveys

From time to time, we request information from users and newsletter subscribers via surveys. Participation in these surveys is voluntary and the user therefore has a choice whether or not to disclose this information. Information requested may include contact information (such as name, phone number, and address), and demographic information (such as ZIP code and child’s grade level). Contact information may be used to notify winners and award prizes.

Survey information will be used for purposes of monitoring or improving the use and satisfaction of this site. The information you provide in response to survey questions may be shared, but only in the aggregate or anonymously, with advertisers and partners, unless we notify you otherwise at the time of collection.

Email Referral Service

If users elect to use our email referral service (“Tell a Friend”), for informing a friend about our site, we ask them for the friend’s name and email address. GreatSchools Inc. will automatically send the friend a one-time email inviting them to visit the site. GreatSchools Inc. stores this information for the sole purpose of sending this one-time email. The friend may contact GreatSchools Inc. at help@greatschools.org to request the removal of this information from our database.

Security

GreatSchools Inc. has implemented commercially reasonable technical and organizational measures designed to secure your personal information from accidental loss and from unauthorized access, use, alteration or disclosure. When users submit sensitive information via the website, GreatSchools Inc. uses commercially reasonable efforts to protect their information both online and offline. However, we cannot guarantee that unauthorized third parties will never be able to defeat those measures or use your personal information for improper purposes. Thus, you acknowledge that you provide your personal information at your own risk.

If and when our registration/order form asks users to enter sensitive information (such as credit card number and/or Social Security number), that information will be encrypted and protected with encryption software called SSL. While on a secure page, such as our order form, the lock icon on the bottom of web browsers such as Netscape Navigator and Microsoft Internet Explorer becomes locked, as opposed to unlocked, or open. Learn more about SSL.

While we use SSL encryption to protect sensitive information online, we will use commercially reasonable efforts to protect personal user information offline. Only employees who need the information to perform a specific job (for example, our billing clerk or a customer service representative) will be granted access to personally identifiable information. Furthermore, all employees are kept up to date on our security and privacy practices. The servers that are used to store personally identifiable information are kept in a secure environment.

If you have any questions about the security at our website, you can send an email to help@greatschools.org.

Data storage and transfer:  Your information collected through our website may be stored and processed in the United States or any other country in which Company or its affiliates or service providers maintain facilities.  If you are located in the European Union or other regions with laws governing data collection and use that may differ from U.S. law, please note that we may transfer information, including personal information, to a country and jurisdiction that does not have the same data protection laws as your jurisdiction, and you we will take all steps reasonably necessary to ensure that any personal data are treated securely and in accordance with this Privacy Policy. Such transfers are made pursuant to appropriate safeguards. If you wish to enquire further about these transfers, please contact us.

Compromise of Security

In the event that personal information is compromised as a result of a breach of security, GreatSchools Inc. will promptly notify those persons whose personal information has been compromised, in accordance with the notification procedures set forth in this Privacy Statement, or as otherwise required by applicable law.

Correction/Updating Personal Information

If a user’s personally identifiable information changes or if a user no longer desires our service, we will endeavor to provide a way to correct, update or remove that user’s personal data provided to us.

Notification of Changes

As we continue to develop our website, this privacy policy likely will change. We will post all changes to this policy on this page and will indicate at the top of this page the policy’s effective date. We therefore encourage you to refer to this policy on an ongoing basis so that you understand our current privacy policy. You agree to review this policy periodically since such changes, modifications, additions or deletions shall be effective immediately upon posting and your subsequent use after such posting shall conclusively be deemed to be acceptance by you of such changes, modifications or deletions.

Login Security

When you choose a password, either as a principal for your Enhanced School Profile or as a parent to join a GreatSchools community, the password is stored on the password-protected GreatSchools Inc. server. However, because Internet communications are generally not secure, you should be aware that when you send your password across the Internet to us, there is a possibility that an experienced hacker could intercept your password. However, we have no evidence to date that password information presents a serious security threat to warrant using a secure shell for this transaction.

A Notice About Our Advertisers

GreatSchools allows advertising by third parties. GreatSchools does not control linking practices of advertisers or sponsors and does not monitor or claim responsibility for any content or privacy practices of such website. Once you have clicked on an advertisement and have left the GreatSchools site, you must read the privacy policy of the advertiser or sponsor to see how your personal information will be handled.

GreatSchools may offer contests, sweepstakes, and promotions that are sponsored by third-party advertisers or sponsors. These third parties may obtain personally identifiable information that visitors voluntarily submit to participate in the activity. GreatSchools does not control the third parties’ use of information.

GreatSchools uses an advertising server (Double Click) developed by a third party to display ads on our site. Some of these ads may contain cookies that are set by third parties (advertisers, sponsors). In addition, we may allow third parties to place cookies or related tools on our site to collect data that may be used to serve advertisements elsewhere (i.e. on other websites). We do not have access to these cookies or other tools or any information that they contain. The GreatSchools privacy policy does not cover any use of information that a third-party may have collected from you. For more information on the privacy practices of DoubleClick, please click here. You may opt out of DoubleClick’s information collection here.

You have choices about what information is gathered and used for serving third-party ads based on your interests. You can opt out of seeing interest-based ads by clicking here. (the AboutAds site). The choices you make on these sites are browser-specific. So, if you use a different browser, you will need to opt out again.

We present some interest-based ads to you directly and sometimes we work with partners to present the ads. These interest-based ads may be for the products and services of our advertising clients or for our own products or services. The Ad Choices Icon appears on ads that use interest based advertising. You can click on it to find out more about why it appeared and if you want to opt out, as described above.

Information from Other Sources

We have partnered with Facebook to provide a more personalized experience on GreatSchools for members of Facebook. When you visit GreatSchools, you will see an option to sign in with Facebook. If you sign in with Facebook, we will show you which of your Facebook friends have connections to schools you may be considering based on their “likes” and education history (i.e. we utilize Facebook’s Open Graph to power our social search feature). We also use Facebook’s social sharing functions to make it easy for you to share schools and school reviews with your Facebook friends, and to comment on GreatSchools articles. In order to provide you with this personalized experience, Facebook provides us with information that you have chosen to make available pursuant to your Facebook privacy settings. That information may include your basic information, email address, name, profile picture, your likes, location, schools you’ve attended (education history), friends list, and any other information you have chosen to make available. We also ask for your friends’ likes and their education histories. We do not share this information with any third party.

If, at any time, you would like to turn off personalization on GreatSchools, you can do so by logging out of Facebook. You can also disable the GreatSchools app in the Your Apps section of the Facebook App Center. Please note that, if you have Facebook friends who are using GreatSchools, they may also have shared information about you with us through Facebook. If you wish to prevent that sharing, you can do so by editing your Facebook privacy settings.

A Notice About External Links

You will find links from GreatSchools to independently owned, controlled, and/or managed website whose content we believe will be of possible interest and value to our visitors. Additionally you’ll see links from advertisers, sponsors and other partners that may use GreatSchools’ logo as part of a co-branding agreement.

In many cases, these links represent cooperative projects or mutual links established with the organizations connected with these sites. We don’t control the content of these links. These other sites may send you their own cookies, collect data, or solicit personal information. While we identify sponsor and advertiser areas of our websites, we do not control these cookies or the content of these third parties.

GreatSchools has partnered with other companies to provide certain services. In some cases, you may see GreatSchools’ logo on another company’s site. GreatSchools does not share any of your personally identifiable information with these partners and they do not share any information with us.

Once you leave our servers (you can generally tell where you are by checking the URL in the location bar on your browser), the use of any information you provide is governed by the privacy policy of the operator of the site you are visiting. That policy may differ from ours. If you can’t find the privacy policy of any of these sites via a link from that site’s home page, you should contact the site directly for more information.

We specifically recommend that parents or teachers monitor any new sites before children connect to them.

Public Forums

GreatSchools makes it possible for our users to share information through options such as school reviews and article feedback. Please remember that any information that is disclosed in these areas becomes public information. Consequently, you should exercise caution when deciding to disclose your personal information.

Our Commitment to Children’s Privacy

Protecting the privacy of young children is especially important. For that reason, GreatSchools does not knowingly collect or maintain personal information through the website from persons under 13 years of age, and no part of our website is directed to persons under 13. If you are under 13 years of age, then please do not use or access the website at any time or in any manner. If GreatSchools learns that personally identifiable information of persons under 13 years of age has been collected through the website without verified parental consent, then GreatSchools will take the appropriate steps to delete this information.

Notification Procedures

It is the policy of GreatSchools to provide notifications, whether such notifications are required by law or are for marketing or other business related purposes, to our customers or website users, via email notice, written or hard copy notice, or through conspicuous posting of such notice on our website page, www.greatschools.org, as determined by GreatSchools in its sole discretion. Notwithstanding the foregoing, GreatSchools reserves the right to determine the form and means of providing notifications to our customers or website users.