Family Educational Rights & Privacy Act (FERPA)

FERPA stands for Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act. Passed by Congress in 1974, FERPA regulates the release of education records and grants four specific rights to students:

• The right to view information the institution is keeping in his/her student file
• The right to seek amendment to those records, and in certain cases, append a statement to the record
• The right to have some control over the disclosure of his/her records
• The right to file a complaint with the Department of Education

Want to know more about the basic rules govering the release of student information? Take the FERPA Tutorial.