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Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA)

Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA)
FERPA protects your student’s personally identifiable information, such as education records, from being disclosed without your consent.

The law allows Renton Schools to disclose “directory information” (listed below) without consent. We do not release mailing or other lists of contact information for commercial purposes. In addition, for students in grades 9-12, a separate “opt out of release of directory information” only for requests from United States military recruiters is provided by law, as explained on the Directory Information for Military Recruiters page.

What is Student Directory Information?

  • Student name, and telephone numbers (unless identified as unknown);
  • Any photographs/video of your student;
  • Participation in officially recognized activities and sports;
  • Weight, height, grade level of athletic team members;
  • Dates of attendance; 
  • Degrees, honors, and awards received; and
  • The most recent previous school attended

Where do we use this Directory Information?

Examples include:

  • Yearbooks;
  • District social media posts;
  • District websites;
  • Videos, including release of District-created videos to local media;
  • Sport teams news reports and other coverage, including rosters

What if I don’t want this information released?

Please submit a letter to your child’s school, each school year, by October 1, to have your student’s Directory Information not released, including in the examples listed above. Each letter is good for one school year. If you enroll your child after September 20, you must submit the letter within 10 calendar days after enrollment.

 Note: Even for students with no FERPA opt-out letter on record, district staff will exercise their best judgement when releasing directory information and seek parent/guardian permission for situations that would generally be considered outside the realm of typical school-related activities or news. Also, the District cannot control the release of certain directory information – such as photographs/images or names – when students participate in school events open to the public such as sports.