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Information for Parents . . .
The Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act of 1974, or FERPA, sets rules regarding the privacy of student records. FERPA governs:
- The release of student education records maintained by an institution.
- Access to these records.
Education records are defined as records that are:
- Directly related to a student and
- Maintained by an educational agency or institution or by a party acting for the agency or institution.
Under FERPA, items defined as directory information may be released by the institution without the written consent of the student. At WMU, the following items are considered directory information:
- Name
- Address
- Telephone number
- WMU e-mail address
- Curriculum and major field of study
- Dates of attendance
- Enrollment status (full/part-time)
- Degrees/awards received
- Most recent previous educational agency or institution attended by the student
- Participation in officially recognized activities and sports
- Weight/height of members of athletic teams.
Students do have the right to request that directory information not be released. To do this, students need to file a request with the Office of the Registrar.
When a student begins attending a post-secondary institution such as WMU FERPA rights transfer from the parent to the student. This occurs regardless of the age of the student.
To facilitate and encourage dialogue between students and their parents, WMU offers two ways in which student information can be shared with parents:
- WMU now has a system in place which allows a student to give a parent authorized user access to view certain academic and financial aid information through the student information system. Access to this information is restricted to what is available in the system and to what has been authorized by the student.
- In addition, students can choose to sign a waiver allowing a faculty or staff member to discuss their records with parents.
In both cases, the choice to grant access belongs to the student and the student has the right to revoke this access at any time.