The Daily Bulletin Archive

From the Vice President for Finance and Management

All student, faculty, and staff personal and academic information is private and confidential, and is protected by various state and federal laws. Buffalo State College employees must, by law, protect the privacy of this information.

Failure to protect personal and academic information may result in legal action against offending employees. Employees accused of failure to protect confidential information that results in harm to an individual may not be covered by the Public Officer's Law, and therefore not defended by New York State.

Examples of personal information that must be kept confidential: Social Security number, health information, disability status, etc. Faculty and staff must ensure that information contained on the current employee change form is kept confidential.

Examples of academic information that must be kept confidential: grades, class schedule, student ID number, etc. Faculty and staff members may not post test scores or grades using any portion of a student's name, Social Security number, or student ID number. Faculty and staff must refrain from providing students' parents with information related to their student's academic performance or other personal information, unless given permission to do so by the student.

For more information:

State and Federal Laws:

-Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (confidentiality of financial information): see

www.buffalostate.edu/offices/hr/information.asp

-HIPAA (confidentiality of health information): see

www.buffalostate.edu/depts/weigel/Confidentialitypolicy.htm

and

http://www.goer.state.ny.us/Training_Development/Online_Learning/HIP/Intro.html

-FERPA (confidentiality of student/academic information): see

www.buffalostate.edu/academicaffairs/x571.xml

and

www.ed.gov/policy/gen/guid/fpco/ferpa/library/hunter.html

-Restrictions on use of student Social Security numbers: see

http://public.leginfo.state.ny.us/MENUGETF.cgi?COMMONQUERY=LAWS+&TARGET=VIEW ; click on Education (EDN) and then Article 1, click on 2-B.

-New NYS law on notification of information security breach: see http://public.leginfo.state.ny.us/MENUGETF.cgi?COMMONQUERY=LAWS+&TARGET=VIEW ; click on General Business (GBS) and scroll to Article 39-F.

Additional information about safeguarding sensitive information can be found at Buffalo State’s Internal Control website.

Questions regarding privacy of the employee change form, employee contracts, official employee files, employee medical leaves and confidential medical information, etc.: Susan Earshen, associate vice president, Human Resources, ext. 3042

Questions regarding privacy of student information and FERPA: Mark Bausili, registrar, ext. 4907

Questions regarding health information and HIPAA: Rock Doyle, assistant director, medical systems, ext. 6711

Questions regarding legal liability and any legal action against the college or an employee:  James Thor, comptroller, ext. 4312