I think the list means no more than this: Now we part after 4 years in the same community. This is the next step in our life. See you again.
agree with coolweather. in our district newsletter and in the community magazine, the plans of all seniors, if known (they have to tell the guidance counselor themselves) are printed. Sure the prestigious college goers are proud, but perhaps the proudest parents are those whose sons list “junior hockey” as they may be on their way to the NHL!
Neither of my kids schools did this. I think it is a privacy concern. You can certainly let your friends know where you are attending school without it being published in the paper.
They do print where kids have been accepted without using names.
yeah, we get it cw.
Just bcos it has the ‘good intentions’ of the community doesn’t mean that the GC has the legal authority to release the college names without permission of an 18-year old student/adult or <18, his/her parents.
Our high school has the “wall of shame” - where students post rejection letters. Our town’s newspaper publishes each kid and their plans for next year - that I know, no one’s complained. It didn’t bother me when my kids’ plans were published. It’s not like it’s a big secret.
@QuantMech, blame the federal government for the opt out issue. It makes it easier for the high schools to pass a higher number of student’s information to military recruiters.
In the last 2 months my kid’s college newspaper repeatly asked me to send my kid’s baby picture and graduation congratutalion message so that the newspaper can publish on the graduation day. This is done without my kid’s permission. Do the newspaper and I violate my kid’s FERPA?
@BTMell but the STUDENTS post their rejection letters. Would you find it appropriate for the SCHOOL to do this without telling anyone or asking permission?
Let’s not be silly, but to answer your question, no, and no. Since you took the picture, you have Intellectual Property rights to it and own it; legally, you may do with it as you see fit. Graduation is a public spectacle…back to Directory items again.
Incidentally, FERPA only applies to those that receive federal dollars, i.e., schools. So you could never be charged with a FERPA violation unless you run a school that receives federal $$.
Posting on a school wall is not the same as sending to the Editor of the local paper. Or look at it another way, the Editor of the local paper does not have the legal right to walk into a school and start publishing anything s/he finds on its walls.
It sounds like this is not uncommon and that most people would not have an issue. Personally, it wouldn’t bother me either. However, you never know who may have an issue for this (or for what reason), and it just seems smarter to get permission.
@romanigypsyeyes definitely! Yes, the kids do it. But the local newspaper does publish who graduates and their post-graduation plans. That doesn’t bother me at all but perhaps it does others. Then again, I’m nosy!
@ bluebayou “Let’s not be silly”
Yes. Let’s not be.
“Since you took the picture, you have Intellectual Property rights to it and own it; legally, you may do with it as you see fit.”
This is not about intellectualy property that I have or my kid has. It’s about publishing a student’s name.
I am not a lawyer, but this is what I have found:
So yes, you can post pictures you have taken without someone’s permission, otherwise FB would be completely shut down.
My D’s high school publishes a list of college acceptances, without student names. I like that idea, but would not if student names were attached to specific schools. If they publish names, they should have consent. They should also publish what other students are doing; "gap year to travel to “X” to help with “y” once again, with consent.
I don’t see what the problem is. Are people actually embarrassed about what school the kid is going to?
No public schools in my area do this. There are ads from one of the privates showing face, and acceptances, with the one student is going to in bold print. I can assume these students approved this, and it is great advertising.
Yes, I can see a student being embarrassed about their school if they didn’t get into their dream schools or couldn’t afford them. They shouldn’t be, but they may be. I also think these public lists can fuel the prestige obsession driving college admissions these days. Some people unfortunately view these lists as the results of a competition – who got into which elite, brand name schools.
In most HSs the list will show that many other kids also did not get into super elites. The kids know. Unless a kid has no contact with other students, they know where the other kids got accepted and where they are going. I think the parents take it much harder than the kids in most cases. Not that there isn’t some of the “how did HE get into super elite and SHE did not!!”. But everyone knows there is some degree of luck involved at the tippy top schools.
I think ttm321 is right about the possibility of students being bothered by publication of the college they will be attending, in some cases.
Information about QMP’s college choice, etc. was published in the local (real) newspaper, with QMP supplying the information. I was fine with that, and I was interested in where other students were going–although if they were QMP’s friends, we generally knew where they were going, ahead of the newspaper.
However, I think that the right to privacy (read by the Supreme Court as being part of the penumbra of the Constitution) is an important right, which is too easily eroded. In my opinion, it should not be waived casually.
We’ve had parents bothered by publication of the Honor Roll, but mostly during terms their students didn’t make the cut.
“Back when…” you were just happy to get in a college and be able to pay for it. The angst and ridiculous hair splitting about where you go these days is silly.