Last modified: October 9th, 2023 

Introduction

Gordon College (“the College”, “we”, “us”, or “our”) is committed to safeguarding your privacy when you visit our website. This Privacy Policy outlines our practices for collecting, using, maintaining, and disclosing information that we may collect from you or that you may provide when you use our websites and other College digital properties. 

This privacy statement applies to the College’s primary domain name gordon.edu and all of its sub-domains. Each of these separate domains is referred to, collectively, as the “Website”.   

This policy applies to information we collect: 

• On the Website. 
• In email, text, and other electronic messages between you and the Website. 

It does not apply to information collected by: 

• Us offline or through any other means, including on any other website operated by the College or any third party; or  
• Any third party, including through any application or content (including advertising) that may link to or be accessible from or through the Website. 

Please read this Privacy Policy carefully to understand our policies and practices regarding your information and how we will treat it. By accessing or using the Website, you agree to this Privacy Policy. If you do not agree with our policies and practices, your choice is not to use our Website.  This policy may change from time to time (see Changes to Our Privacy Policy). Your continued use of this Website after we make changes is deemed to be acceptance of those changes, so please check the policy periodically for updates. 

Children Under the Age of 13 

Our Website is not intended for children under 13 years of age. No one under age 13 may provide any personal information to or on the Website. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children under 13. If you are under 13, do not use or provide any information on this Website or through any of its features, or provide any information about yourself to us, including your name, address, telephone number, email address, or any screen name or user name you may use. If we learn we have collected or received personal information from a child under 13 without verification of parental consent, we will delete that information. If you believe we might have any information from or about a child under 13, please contact us at [email protected]. 

California residents under 16 years of age may have additional rights regarding the collection and sale of their personal information. Please see Your State Privacy Rights for more information. 

Information We Collect About You and How We Collect It 

We may collect several types of information from and about users of our Website, including:   

• Personal Information: Personal information is any information that can be used to identify an individual. We may collect personal information such as your name, email address, mailing address, phone number, and other details when you provide it to us through forms, emails, or other means of communication on the Website.
• Non-Personal Information: Non-personal information is data that cannot be used to identify an individual. We may collect and store non-personal information, such as browser type, operating system, IP address, and browsing patterns, to analyze trends and optimize our Website.   

We collect this information: 

• Directly from you when you provide it to us. 
• Automatically as you navigate through the site. Information collected automatically may include usage details, IP addresses, and information collected through cookies, web beacons, and other tracking technologies. 
• From third parties, for example, our business partners. 

Information Voluntarily Provided by You   

The information we collect on our Website may include: 

• Information that you provide by filling in forms on our Website. 
• Records and copies of your correspondence (including email addresses), if you contact us.

Additionally, Gordon College may collect information about you via web-based forms, other forms of communication, and/or registering for an event or to receive information or services that are made accessible to users. This information may contain personally identifiable data such as your name, address, email address, telephone number, photographs, video, voice content, social security number, credit card information, bank information, password, or any combination of data that could be used to identify you such as your birth date, your zip code and your gender.

While most voluntary information is only maintained long enough to provide the specific service requested, some personally identifiable information may be retained longer to meet specific Records Retention Schedules as mandated by the State of Massachusetts or other regulatory bodies, and/or as part of backup procedures. In addition, some personally identifiable information may be added to College databases to be used for other required College business, legal and/or academic purposes.   
Information Automatically Collected   

As you navigate through and interact with our Website, we may use automatic data collection technologies to collect certain information about your equipment, browsing actions, and patterns, including: 

• Details of your visits to our Website, including traffic data, location data, logs, and other communication data and the resources that you access and use on the Website. 
• Information about your computer and internet connection, including your IP address, operating system, and browser type. 
• Essential technical information such as pages accessed; time and date accessed; operating system used; type of browser used; information about the website from which you accessed this website and connection statistics (e.g. ports, number bytes, number packets, time of first and last packet, etc.). 

The technologies we use for this automatic data collection may include cookies, web beacons, and other tracking technologies.  
We do not collect personal information automatically, but we may tie this information to personal information about you that we collect from other sources or you provide to us.

Some content or applications, including advertisements, on the Website are served by third-parties, including advertisers, ad networks and servers, content providers, and application providers. These third parties may use cookies alone or in conjunction with web beacons or other tracking technologies to collect information about you when you use our website. The information they collect may be associated with your personal information or they may collect information, including personal information, about your online activities over time and across different websites and other online services. They may use this information to provide you with interestbased (behavioral) advertising or other targeted content.

We do not control these third parties' tracking technologies or how they may be used. If you have any questions about an advertisement or other targeted content, you should contact the responsible provider directly. For information about how you can opt out of receiving targeted advertising from many providers, see Choices About How We Use and Disclose Your Information.

How We Use Your Information 

We may use the information we collect about you or that you provide to us, including personal information, to:   

• Provide, maintain, and improve the Website and our services.   
• Communicate with you about your inquiries, applications, or other matters related to the College.   
• Send you promotional materials, newsletters, or other information that may be of interest to you, if you have consented to receive such materials.   
• Analyze trends and user behavior on the Website to optimize its performance and content.   
• Protect the security and integrity of the Website and the College.   
• Fulfill any other purpose with your consent.   

Information that is automatically collected may be retained as necessary for appropriate business purposes to review and enhance website content and program delivery. While in general this information is not reported or used in any manner that would reveal personally identifiable information, it should be noted that this information, along with other information that might be available, may enable Gordon College to identify an individual involved in a specific transmission and that this information may be forwarded to law enforcement agencies or appropriate College personnel when required as part of an investigation.   

Continued use of our Website indicates consent to the collection, use, and disclosure of this information as described in this Privacy Statement.

Disclosure and Information Sharing 

Gordon College may share aggregate, non-personally identifiable information with other entities or organizations without restriction. 
We may disclose personal information that we collect or you provide as described in this privacy policy: 

• To appropriate College personnel or departments to ensure the functionality, quality and/or security of our websites, or to manage your relationship with the College. 
• To vendors, contractors, service providers, and other third parties we use to support our activities. 
• To fulfill the purpose for which you provide it. 
• For any other purpose disclosed by us when you provide the information. 
• With your consent. 

 We may also disclose your personal information: 

• To comply with any court order, law, or legal process, including to respond to any government or regulatory request. 
• When we have given you clear notice that we will disclose information that you voluntarily provide. 
• With appropriate external parties, such as law enforcement agencies, in order to investigate, verify or enforce compliance with the policies governing our website and applicable laws, or to protect against misuse or unauthorized use of our website. Any such disclosures shall comply with applicable laws and College policies. 

Use of Third-Party Services 

Gordon College and its websites use third party applications for data analytics. This includes Google Analytics, a web analytics service provided by Google, Inc. (“Google”), which is utilized by some of our sites. Google Analytics uses cookies to help the website analyze how users use the site. The information generated by the cookie about your use of the website (including possibly your IP address) will be transmitted to and stored by Google.   

For more information, please visit Google’s Privacy Policy.   

Choices About How We Use and Disclose Your Information 

We strive to provide you with choices regarding the personal information you provide to us. We have created mechanisms to provide you with the following control over your information:  

• Tracking Technologies and Advertising. You can set your browser to refuse all or some browser cookies, or to alert you when cookies are being sent. If you disable or refuse cookies, please note that some parts of this site may then be inaccessible or not function properly. 

We do not control third parties' collection or use of your information to serve interest-based advertising. However these third parties may provide you with ways to choose not to have your information collected or used in this way. You can opt out of receiving targeted ads from members of the Network Advertising Initiative ("NAI") on the NAI's website (https://thenai.org/).  

Residents of certain states, such as California, Nevada, Colorado, Connecticut, Virginia, and Utah may have additional personal information rights and choices. Please see Your State Privacy Rights for more information.

Data Security 

We have implemented measures designed to secure your personal information from accidental loss and from unauthorized access, use, alteration, and disclosure. Any payment transactions will be encrypted using SSL technology.

The safety and security of your information also depends on you. Where we have given you (or where you have chosen) a password for access to certain parts of our Website, you are responsible for keeping this password confidential. We ask you not to share your password with anyone.

Unfortunately, the transmission of information via the internet is not completely secure. Although we do our best to protect your personal information, we cannot guarantee the security of your personal information transmitted to our Website. Any transmission of personal information is at your own risk. We are not responsible for circumvention of any privacy settings or security measures contained on the Website. 

Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA)

The federal Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) affords students certain rights with respect to their education records. For more information on the College’s FERPA policies, please visit: https://www.gordon.edu/ferpa 

Changes to our Privacy Policy 

It is our policy to post any changes we make to our privacy policy on this page. If we make material changes to how we treat our users' personal information, we will notify you through a notice on the Website home page. The date the privacy policy was last revised is identified at the top of the page. You are responsible for ensuring we have an up-to-date active and deliverable email address for you, and for periodically visiting our Website and this privacy policy to check for any changes.

Contacting Us

If you have questions regarding our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use, its implementation, failure to adhere to this Privacy Policy and Terms of Service and/or our general practices, please contact us at  [email protected] or send your comments to:

Gordon College   
Center for Technological Services   
ATTN: Website Privacy Policy   
255 Grapevine Road  Wenham MA, 01984