Privacy Notice

OFFICE OF INSTITUTIONAL EFFECTIVENESS

The Office of Institutional Effectiveness (OIE), which serves as an official data source for the College, is committed to safeguarding that data and protecting the privacy of individuals who study at the College. This Privacy Policy outlines the Office’s collection, use, and disclosure of data about you.

INFORMATION COLLECTED BY THE OFFICE OF INSTITUTIONAL EFFECTIVENESS

OIE receives information about you (Information) through two main sources. First, it analyzes and disseminates information that other offices of the College have collected about you.  For example, OIE analyzes data that the Office of Admissions receives from you, as well as information collected about you by other divisions while you are a student here, such as information about your academic performance from the Registrar’s office.

Second, OIE collects data about you from surveys that it administers while you are on campus as a student.  These include national benchmarking studies and locally designed surveys.

National benchmarking studies may include:

  • Beginning College Survey of Student Engagement
  • The Healthy Minds Study
  • Interfaith Diversity Experiences and Attitudes Longitudinal Survey
  • National Survey of Student Engagement
  • Cooperative Institutional Research Program
  • Gallup Student Survey

Internally designed surveys, administered by Goucher to its student community, may include the following topics:

  • Academic Writing Assessment
  • ACE Feedback
  • Campus Community
  • Career Volunteer Survey
  • Course/Curriculum Planning and Evaluation
  • Follow-Up Surveys for Undergraduates and Graduates
  • Freshman First-Year Experience
  • Goucher Climate
  • Orientation
  • Student Athlete
  • Student Elections and Leadership
  • Study Abroad
  • Title IX Climate Survey
  • Transfer First-Year Experience
  • Writing Program
  • Learning to Change

The above list may subject to change; and the administration schedule rotates based on the institutional data collection needs.

COLLEGE USE OF INFORMATION

OIE will use Information that you provide to us and Information we collect about you for two main legitimate purposes – internal and external reporting; and conducting research to inform decision-making and policy development within the College.

Internal Reporting

OIE may provide information that it receives about you to individuals, programs and departments of the college in order to inform planning and decision-making, to improve student retention and success, and to improve college programming.  For example, we may use information collected through the Title IX climate survey to improve the services offered by the Office of Title IX.

External Reporting

The College also reports certain information about you to federal and state entities and other outside entities.  With certain limited exceptions, described below, this data is provided in aggregated form and does not identify you. These entities include the following:

  • The Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS), which is a system of interrelated surveys conducted annually by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), a part of the Institute for Education Sciences within the United States Department of Education. The completion of all IPEDS surveys is mandatory for all institutions that participate in any federal financial assistance program authorized by Title IV of the Higher Education Act of 1965, as amended. Your information is included in the aggregated data reported to IPEDS. The data are aggregated to provide IPEDS with information on topics such as enrollment, admissions, completions, and financial aid. IPEDS Reports include the following surveys:
    • 12-Month Enrollment Survey
    • Academic Libraries Survey
    • Admissions Survey
    • Completions Survey
    • Fall Enrollment Survey
    • Finance Survey
    • Human Resources Survey
    • Institutional Characteristics Survey
    • Outcome Measures Survey
    • Student Financial Aid Survey

  • The Maryland Independent Colleges and Universities Association. OIE reports aggregated data to MICUA via an annual survey titled the Accountability Survey, including data elements on application, admissions, enrollment, courses, and alumni. This information is included in the aggregated data reported to MICUA.

  • Guidebook surveys. OIE submits institutional aggregated data to guidebooks or other third parties, such as the College Board, U.S News and World Report, and the Princeton Review.

*A note about disclosure of personal information:

OIE is required by Maryland state law to provide certain personal, disaggregated information about you to the Maryland Higher Education Commission.  This information includes name, gender, birthdate, race/ethnicity, enrollment status, credit hours, admissions test scores, and information about your high school GPA and enrollment history.

As a Title IV institution, Goucher is also required to participate in the NCES longitudinal studies, such as the National Postsecondary Student Aid Study (NPSAS), Beginning Postsecondary Students Longitudinal Study (BPS), and Baccalaureate and Beyond Longitudinal Study (B&B) collections. If an enrollment record at Goucher is randomly selected to be included in these studies, OIE will release personal, disaggregated information to the NCES.

If we are required to disclose Sensitive Information about you to these entities, and we obtained that information from you while you were a resident of the European Union, we will obtain your affirmative consent to disclose such information, as required by the General Data Protection Regulation. 2016/679. http://ec.europa.eu/justice/data-protection/reform/files/regulation_oj_en.pdf. “Sensitive Information” is information or data that reveals racial or ethnic origin, political opinions, religious or philosophical beliefs, trade union membership, genetic data, biometric data for the purpose of uniquely identifying a natural person, data concerning health or data concerning a natural person’s sex life or sexual orientation.

Research

OIE also uses the Information that it collects to conduct research, to inform planning and decision-making, to improve student retention and success, and to support assessment and accreditation at a variety of organizational levels.

For example, Goucher participates in a national survey titled the Cooperative Institutional Research Program (CIRP). The information OIE collects will help the College learn more about the incoming class and thus better design the academic and social support programs to help students succeed at the College. Additionally, students may also be asked to respond to the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE). NSSE helps the College understand how students are spending time in and out of the classroom, which guides decisions that will benefit all Goucher students.

Your participation in these national surveys is voluntary and your responses to the survey questions remain confidential.

REGARDING DISCLOSURE TO THIRD PARTIES

As noted above, in all cases but two, we disclose information about you to third parties only in aggregated, de-identified form.

If we are required to disclose Sensitive information about you, and we obtained that information from you while you were a resident of the European Union, we will obtain your affirmative consent to disclose such information, as required by the General Data Protection Regulation. 2016/679. http://ec.europa.eu/justice/data-protection/reform/files/regulation_oj_en.pdf.

RETENTION AND DESTRUCTION OF YOUR INFORMATION

Your information will be retained by OIE in accordance with the applicable retention periods in the Record Management Policy adopted by the college.

Your information will be destroyed upon your request or after the expiration of the applicable retention period, whichever is later.  The manner of destruction shall be appropriate to preserve and ensure the confidentiality of your information given the level of sensitivity, value and criticality to the College.

YOUR RIGHTS

Please consult Goucher’s Privacy Policy regarding your rights to request access to, a copy of, rectification, restriction in the use of, or erasure of your information.