University stands by commitment to student privacy, focuses on teacher training

A UA professor violated the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act when he posted his students' names, grades and the last four digits of their student identification numbers online last month.

Now Charles Brainerd, the instructor of SERP 600, Learning and Memory, might have to receive additional training on privacy law, UA officials said.

The violation occurred when Brainerd posted the results of the class' third exam on the class Web site.

"FERPA clearly covers keeping an individual student's grades private," said Sharon Kha, associate vice president for university communications and director of news services. "It's not an ambiguous area."

Once Interim Dean of the College of Education Teresa McCarty was made aware of the situation, she contacted Brainerd and asked him to remove the grades immediately, which he did, according to Kha.

The College of Education made the decision to provide additional training to those faculty who are posting student grades, Kha said.

In order to access the Student Information System in the first place, all faculty members and staff must first complete training, said Sandra Knighton, assistant registrar and custodian for student records.

"We train faculty and staff as to the laws of FERPA and the university laws as far as privacy," Knighton said.

"At the University we are really committed to student privacy, and although there have been issues from time to time, the answer has always been education for employees, in providing them with training," Kha said.

Repercussions, however, could vary if students were to file a complaint with the National Family Policy Compliance Office.

"We evaluate the response and if a violation has occurred we work with the school to help it come into compliance with the law," said Jim Bradshaw, a spokesperson for U.S. Department of Education.

"Should a school utterly refuse to comply, the law provides for an enforcement penalty of cutting off education department funds, but we have almost always been able to work out problems with schools short of that."

While the posting upset some of the students in Brainerd's class, none of them would say if they would file a complaint with the national FPC office.