Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA)

If you are 18 years old and enrolled in classes at an institution of higher learning, the federal Family Education Rights & Privacy Act (FERPA) stipulates that your academic records belong to you. This means that a university is not permitted to release information about your record to anyone, including your parent or guardian, without your explicit consent. NYU will therefore communicate information about your record (transcript, grades, tuition bill, housing information, etc.) only to you. Please be informed about this law and make sure to read all email sent from NYU offices to your NYU email account. It is your responsibility to pass information about your record (i.e., tuition bill) to your parents or other parties who may be managing or coordinating your business for you.

If you would like to permit another party (e.g. a parent or guardian) to have access to your education records, you must grant written permission before the University can release information from your education record. For assistance with the process to release information from your education record, contact Celeste Orangers, Assistant Dean for Academic Policy Administration. For more information read the full FERPA policy statement.

As a parent or guardian, you are understandably concerned about your college student’s success, and may have questions about obtaining access to information pertaining to her or his education records. Access to student education records is governed by the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act of 1974 (FERPA). For more information, please read the complete FERPA policy statement on the University’s web site.

Among its several purposes, FERPA was enacted to:
• Protect the privacy of students’ education records*
• Establish the rights of students to inspect and review their education records
• Provide students with an opportunity to allow inaccurate or misleading information in their education records to be corrected.

*Education Records are defined as those records, files, documents, and other materials that contain information directly related to a student and that are maintained by the University. Examples of education records might include the admissions docket, departmental docket, placement docket (if student has a file there), financial aid docket (if student has applied for aid), advisement and counseling dockets, bursar's docket, etc.

The rights protected by FERPA belong only to the student once he/she is in attendance at an institution of postsecondary education, regardless of the student’s age or who is paying their tuition bills. Since parents or guardians do not automatically have rights under FERPA to access their student’s education records, you may gain access only by one of the following procedures below:

1)  Speak directly with your student and ask her/him to share information with you about her/his education records. Students have 24-hour, online access to education records maintained in the Student Information System, and they are also able to add an authorized user to their electronic billing account. Also, your student may opt to have a copy of her/his transcript sent directly to you by following the Office of the Registrar’s transcript request instructions . This open line of communication is the best way to track your student’s progress and development, and to assist him or her with administrative issues.

2)  Your student may permit University officials (deans, professors, advisors, administrators, etc.) to disclose (orally or through other forms of communication information to you from her or his education records. Before a University official can communicate with you about the specifics of your student's situation, the student must submit to the University a written and signed consent to disclose information. This consent should specify the information that may be disclosed, state the purpose of the disclosure, and identify by name the person to whom information can be released. If written consent is not submitted in person to an appropriate office, then the student's signature must be acknowledged by a notary public, attesting that the person who signed is who he or she said they were (the student).

The type of information the student wants to share (e.g., financial aid records, enrollment information, grades and transcript information, etc.) will determine the University office or official who can release the information. For example, if a Gallatin student wants to grant permission for a parent or guardian to speak with someone about his or her academic performance, the student should complete the Gallatin Consent to Disclose Academic Record Information form. Since Gallatin does not maintain all of the various types of education records (e.g., financial aid, tuition bills, etc.) the Gallatin Consent to Disclose Academic Record Information will not include the release of non-academic records.

Gallatin students or their parents/guardians needing assistance with the process to release information should contact Celeste Orangers, Assistant Dean for Academic Policy Administration, (212) 998-7348.

3)  You, the parent(s) or guardian(s), may also make a request in writing, and provide evidence that the student is your dependent under the Internal Revenue Code. You will need to provide a copy of your latest federal income tax return. It is only necessary to send a copy of the information sufficient enough to determine dependency, omitting other confidential information, if you choose. Before the University decides whether to provide the information, your student will be informed of your request, which should be sent to:

New York University / Office of the Assistant Provost
194 Mercer Street, Room 403F
New York, NY 10012
212-998-2310