The School Boards ("The School Boards", "TSB", "we" or "us") is strongly committed to protecting the privacy of those who access or use our Web Site. This Privacy Policy is designed to help you understand how we collect and use any information you decide to share as part of using The School Boards, located at www.theschoolboards.com and its directly associated domains (collectively "Web Site").
About The School Boards
The School Boards is an interactive online service that provides information services, content, online community and transaction capabilities provided by The School Boards, affiliates of The School Boards, and other third parties. People can view articles, reviews, posts and information on the Web Site without registering, or they can choose to register and set up an online profile to become a member of The School Boards network (each, a "Member" and collectively, the "Members"). To provide an enhanced experience, we request and display some personal information of Members to other Members and visitors, which allows our users to identify each other and expand their network of friends. Members of The School Boards can change their profile information at any time and can control how other Members and The School Boards communicate with them.
INFORMATION WE COLLECT
We collect two types of information about our Website users: Personally Identifiable Information and Non-Personally Identifiable Information.
Personally Identifiable Information
Personally Identifiable Information is personal information that identifies a specific end user. The School Boards collects Personally Identifiable Information from you when you register with our Web Site, update your profile, interact with other Members, and use various features of the Web Site. To register with The School Boards, you must provide certain pieces of information, such as your birth date, name and email address. You also have the ability to provide additional optional information to add to your personal profile. When you submit this information, we will send you a confirmation email that you must respond to in order to complete the registration process. After you are registered, you can edit your profile and add and edit your information. By using the privacy settings on your profile, you can control which Members have access to certain of your personal profile data. Keep in mind, however, that certain basic profile data cannot be hidden and will always be displayed on the Web Site once you register.
We may also collect information regarding your interaction with other users and your use of the Web Site. From time to time we may ask you to respond to surveys or other requests for information and we collect the information you provide. We may collect information from you when you participate in sweepstakes and promotions offered on our Web Site. We may also collect information about you through other methods, including research surveys or information we obtain from third parties, including verification services, data services, as well as public sources. We use this information to continually offer you the most value as a member of The School Boards.
All personally identifiable information that we collect may be used by The School Boards as provided in this Privacy Policy or as disclosed at the time you provide the information or as otherwise agreed by you. As described further in this Privacy Policy, such use of personally identifiable information may include, but is not limited to, (i) providing you with any requested information, goods or services; (ii) sending you information about additional goods or services you may be interested in; (iii) sharing such information with third parties that we believe may offer goods or services of interest to you; and (iv) sharing with or selling such information to any successor to or purchaser of part or all of the assets of The School Boards business.
Non-Personally Identifiable Information
Non-Personally Identifiable Information is information that does not identify an end user. This type of information my include things like the Uniform Resource Locater ("URL") of the website you visited before coming to our Website, the URL of the website you visited after leaving our Website, the type of browser you are using and your Internet Protocol ("IP") address. We, and/or our authorized third party service providers and advertisers may automatically collect this information when you visit our Website through the use of electronic tools like Cookies and other technologies, as described below.
Data Tracking
Like most standard Website servers, we collect information from all visitors to our Web Site. This information may include the browser you are using, the internet address from which you linked to our Web Site, the operating system of your computer, the unique IP address of the computer you used to access our Web Site, and usage and browsing habits. We use this information to help diagnose and troubleshoot server malfunctions, to analyze trends, track user movement in the aggregate, and gather broad demographic information. This aggregate data helps us determine how much our customers use parts of the Web Site so we can improve it. We may also use individual information we collect through web logs to send you targeted offers and other communications.
Cookies
When you visit The School Boards, we may assign your computer one or more cookies to facilitate access to our site and to personalize your online experience. Through the use of a cookie, we also may automatically collect information about your online activity on the Web Site, such as the web pages you visit, the links you click, and the searches you conduct on our site. Most browsers automatically accept cookies, but you can usually modify your browser setting to decline cookies. If you choose to decline cookies, please note that you may not be able to sign in or use some of the interactive features offered on the Web Site.
Other Technologies
We may use standard Internet technology, such as web beacons and other similar technologies, to track your use of our Web Site. We also may include web beacons in promotional or other email messages or newsletters to determine whether messages have been opened and acted upon. The information we obtain in this manner enables us to customize the services we offer our website visitors to deliver targeted advertisements and to measure the overall effectiveness of our online advertising, content, programming, or other activities.
Information collected by third parties
We may allow third parties, including our authorized service providers, advertising companies, and ad networks, to display advertisements on our site. These companies may use tracking technologies, such as cookies, to collect information about users who view or interact with their advertisements. Our website does not provide any personal information to these third parties. This information allows them to deliver targeted advertisements and gauge their effectiveness. Some of these third-party advertising companies may be advertising networks that are members of the Network Advertising Initiative, which offers a single location to opt-out of ad targeting from member companies.
DoubleClick DART Cookie
Google, as a third party vendor, uses cookies to serve ads on www.theschoolboards.com. Google's use of the DART cookie enables it to serve ads to users based on their visit to www.theschoolboards.com and other sites on the Internet. Users may opt out of the use of the DART cookie by visiting the Google ad and content network privacy policy at the following URL - http://www.google.com/privacy_ads.html.
Security of Information
You can access your personal information on the Web Site through a password and your username. The password is encrypted. We recommend that you do not share your password with anyone. We do not store credit card information on our servers. This information is collected and sent on to our transaction processing company.
However, despite our efforts, no data transmission over the Internet or any wireless network can be guaranteed to be 100% secure and no system can completely guaranty that there will never be unauthorized access to your personally identifiable information. As a result, while we employ commercially reasonable security measures to protect data and seek to partner with companies which do the same, we cannot guarantee the security of any information transmitted to or from the Web Site, and are not responsible for the actions of any third parties that may receive any such information, and your use of the Web Site indicates that you are willing to assume this risk.
USE OF INFORMATION AND INFORMATION SHARING
When you Register
When you register with The School Boards, you create your own profile and privacy settings. Your profile information, as well as your user name and photo are displayed to people in the networks specified in your privacy settings to allow you to connect with other Members of The School Boards Network. Your user name will be displayed to all users regardless of privacy settings, so you should use a user name that you are comfortable having displayed. Other members can search for you by user name. You can control in your privacy settings whether or not you wish to display your email address.
Please be aware that certain personal profile information is displayed for all Members and cannot be hidden. Specifically, your user name and photo are always displayed on the Web Site and therefore, are viewable by all users. In addition, because this information is publicly displayed on the Web Site, it may appear in the results of searches conducted on Internet search engines while you are a Member of the Web Site and potentially for some time period after your membership is terminated, depending upon the search engine's indexing practices.
Email and Newsletters
The School Boards may send you service-related announcements and emails from time to time. We may also use your information to send you e-newsletters, updates and communications about The School Boards. You may opt-out of receiving future emails as described at the bottom of each communication from The School Boards.
Notifications
The School Boards may send announcements in the form of email about activity that takes place on the site relating to you. For example, this might include activity in one of your groups, or activity of one of your friends. You can change the delivery options for these notifications in your Profile and Settings area.
Sweepstakes and Promotions
On occasion, we may offer sweepstakes and other promotions in conjunction with a sponsor. By participating in a promotion, you submit to that promotion's terms and conditions including providing us with permission, if required, to share your personally identifiable information with a particular sponsor.
Third Party Offers
On occasion, we are able to offer you special products or services through a relationship with a third party. In those cases, the offer will be brought to you by The School Boards and fulfilled by the third party. If you accept the offer, you will become a customer of the company that is fulfilling the offer, and we will not have control over their use of the personally identifiable information that you provide to them when you accept the offer. You will also be given the opportunity to opt in to receive future information and offers from The School Boards or our select partners that we believe may be of special interest to you. Once you opt in, we may share your contact information, including your name, user name, billing address, and telephone number. Should you later choose not to receive these communications, you may so indicate by changing your user settings or by responding to any of these communications, each of which will clearly explain how to opt out of future communications. You may also opt out by sending a request to support [at] theschoolboards.com.
Invite a Friend
If you do become a Member, not only can you enjoy all of the benefits of membership, but you can also invite other individuals to join by providing us with their names and email addresses. Using the information you give us on these potential Members, we will send them an email invitation to join The School Boards. The only way these individuals can become Members, however, is if they come to the Web Site and sign up themselves. We do not use this information for other purposes.
Legal Requirements / Safety
We may, without your consent, access and disclose your information, any communications sent or received by you, and any other information that we may have about you or your account as may be permitted or required by law (including, but not limited to, in response to a court order or subpoena), or to prevent or investigate suspected fraud, violations of our Terms of Service, or activity that appears to us to be illegal or may expose us to legal liability. Additionally, we may disclose your information in situations that we believe to be emergencies involving potential threats to the physical safety of any person or property if we believe that your information in any way relates to that threat. We may disclose personal information if required to do so by law or in the good faith belief that such action is necessary to conform with the law or legal process or to protect or defend our rights or property. We may also share aggregated information with other companies with which we do business.
Sale of Business or Assets
In the event that The School Boards, substantially all of its assets, or a line of business are acquired or merged with another company, personally identifiable information of our Members may be one of the assets sold or merged in connection with that transaction. The School Boards will notify users of the Web Site of such a change in ownership or transfer of assets by posting a notice on the Web Site.
Unsubscribe
As discussed above, you can always choose not to provide information, although it may be required to engage in a certain activity on the Web Site. As a condition of use of our products and services, we will send you Administrative and Promotional Emails (as defined below). We will send you information regarding your account activity and purchases as well as updates about our products and promotional offers. You cannot opt-out of Administrative Emails. "Administrative Emails" relate to a user's activity on the Web Site, and include emails regarding a particular user's account, requests or inquiries, and purchases of products and services. In contrast to Administrative Emails, however, you do have a choice with respect to "Promotional Emails" which advertise our products and services, including exclusive sales and other offers, and/or the products and services of our advertisers and affiliates. If you do not want to receive Promotional Emails from us, you may elect to opt-out of receiving Promotional Emails at any time after registering by emailing us at support [at] theschoolboards.com or by hitting the "unsubscribe" button at the bottom of any of our emails. When contacting us via email, please indicate your name, address, email address, and what Promotional Emails you do not want to receive. Please note that if you receive promotional emails from a third party affiliate or advertiser, you must contact the entity that sent you the email directly to unsubscribe from their promotional mailing list.
ADDITIONAL PRIVACY ISSUES
Children
Minors under the age of 13 may not use the Website. We do not collect or maintain information from anyone known to be under the age of 13, and no part of the Web Site is designed to attract anyone under the age of 13. The School Boards does not sell products for purchase by children. In certain instances, we sell children's products for purchase by adults.
Public Areas
We may provide areas on the Web Site where you can publicly post information about yourself, can communicate with others, or can submit posts, reviews and media content. This information may be accessible by other consumers and companies and may appear on other websites or web searches, and therefore this information could be read, collected, and used by others. For example, if you post your email address along with a public restaurant review, you may receive unsolicited messages. We have no control over who reads your postings or what other users may do with the information you voluntarily post, so please use caution when posting any personal information.
Notice of Privacy Rights to California Residents
California law requires that we provide you with a summary of your privacy rights under the California Online Privacy Protection Act (the "Act") and the California Business and Professions Code. As required by the Act, we will provide you with the categories of Personally Identifiable Information that we collect through the Web Site and the categories of third party persons or entities with whom such Personally Identifiable Information may be shared for direct marketing purposes at your request. California law requires us to inform you, at your request, (1) the categories of Personally Identifiable Information we collect and what third parties we share that information with; (2) the names and addresses of those third parties; and (3) examples of the products marketed by those companies. The Act further requires us to allow you to control who you do not want us to share that information with. To obtain this information, please send a request by email at support [at] theschoolboards.com. When contacting us, please indicate your name, address, email address, and what Personally Identifiable Information you do not want us to share with Affiliated Businesses or Marketing Partners. The request should be sent to the attention of our legal department, and labeled "California Customer Choice Notice." Please allow 30 days for a response. Also, please note that there is no charge for controlling the sharing of your Personally Identifiable Information or requesting this notice.
Third Party Websites
The School Boards contains links to other sites. It is possible for you to receive information directly from our partners and other companies if you access them through a link on the Web Site or if you go directly to their Websites. Once you are on their sites, any data that you supply to these partners, for example, to obtain information or buy products directly from them is beyond our reach and will be the responsibility of each of the linked-to entities and not The School Boards. We are not responsible for the privacy practices or the content of these Websites or any other sites linked to or referenced on our Site.
Updating Your Personal Information
If you are a member of The School Boards, you can update your personally identifiable information at any time. To do this, just click on the "Profile and Settings" link listed throughout the Site. However, we are unable to update or delete any of your personally identifiable information that has been shared with a third party as permitted in this Privacy Policy.
Visiting the Web Site From Outside the United States
This Privacy Policy is intended to cover collection of information on the Web Site from residents of the United States. If you are visiting our website from outside the United States, please be aware that your information may be transferred to, stored, and processed in the United States where our servers are located and our central database is operated. The data protection and other laws of the United States might not be as comprehensive as those in your country. Please be assured that we seek to take reasonable steps to ensure that your privacy is protected. By using our services, you understand that your information may be transferred to our facilities and those third parties with whom we share it as described in this Privacy Policy.
No Rights of Third Parties
This Privacy Policy does not create rights enforceable by third parties or require disclosure of any personal information relating to users of the Web Site.
Your consent
By using the Web Site, you consent to abide by our Privacy Policy.
Changes to our Privacy Policy
We reserve the right to change this Privacy Policy from time to time by posting the revised Privacy Policy in the Privacy Policy section of the Web Site. The revised Privacy Policy is effective immediately when posted on the Web Site. It is the responsibility of each user to review the Web Site and the Privacy Policy periodically to learn of any revisions to this Privacy Policy. Your continued use of the Web Site after the effectiveness of such revisions constitutes your acknowledgement and acceptance of the terms of the revised Privacy Policy.
Questions about Our Privacy Policy
For questions about our Privacy Policy, please contact us at via email at support [at] theschoolboards.com.