Privacy policy

Effective Date: June 1, 2021

This Privacy Policy describes how Gettysburg College (“Gettysburg”, “we”, “our”, or “us”) collects, uses, and shares personal information of our students, alumni, faculty, staff, donors, and users of this website, and other websites that we own or control and link or refer to this Privacy Policy (the “Sites”), including, but not limited to, student, recruitment, and alumni portals.

We periodically update this Privacy Policy and reserve the right to change the provisions of this Policy or our privacy practices at any time. We encourage you to review this site periodically, and we will alert you that changes have been made by updating the Effective Date of the Policy. Your use of the Sites constitutes consent to any changes in this Policy as in effect on the date of such use.

On this page:

Personal information defined

Personal information is any information that personally identifies an individual or from which an individual could be identified. Personal information can include name, mailing address, email address, phone number, username or account number. It may also include other information about you, such as gender, date of birth, or other demographic information. Information gathered or generated by your use of the Sites, such as IP address or cookies may also be personal information, if that other information is linked to other personal information about you.

Your rights to access your personal information

You have the right to access personal information about you that we have collected through our Sites by sending a request for access to dataprivacy@gettysburg.edu. You can also request that we correct any such information by sending an email to the same address. To verify that the request is authentic, we may require that such request be sent from the email address associated with your personal information. While we will comply reasonably and promptly with your request, we may need to retain some of your information for our own recordkeeping or to fulfill a legal obligation.

How Gettysburg collects your personal information

We collect personal information that you provide to us. For example:

  • If you apply to be a student at Gettysburg, we will require you to provide your name, email address, phone number, standardized test scores, and other information.
  • If you apply for or are considered for financial aid or other scholarships, we may require you to provide financial and/or tax information.
  • If you apply to work for Gettysburg, we may ask you to provide more detailed and sensitive personal information required for compliance with our hiring and equal opportunity policies and practices.
  • Our Sites include social media features, such as links to our Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Twitter, YouTube, and other pages. Your interactions with these features are governed by the privacy policy of each social media platform.

We may obtain personal information from third parties, such as other schools, references, family members, and education partners (e.g. The Common Application, The College Board, etc.) as part of an application package.

We also collect some of your information automatically when you visit our Sites and any software applications made available by us for use on or through computers and mobile devices. For example, our Sites collect your IP address and other online identifiers and record the pages that you visit and other information about your activity on the Sites.

Our Sites may contain links to other websites. Other websites’ collection of your information is governed by their own privacy policies.

Cookies

Like many other websites, we ask you to allow us to use “cookies” to remember information about you and improve your browsing experience on our Sites. If you reject cookies, you may still use our Sites, but your ability to use some features or areas of our Sites may be limited. We may also work with third-party providers who may use cookies on our Sites. You can block cookies by activating the setting on your browser that allows you to refuse the use of all or some cookies. For more information about cookies, including how to set your internet browser to reject cookies, please go to All About Cookies or the Network Advertising Initiative.

How Gettysburg uses personal information

We may use your personal information to:

  • Evaluate students’ applications;
  • Assess scholarship and financial aid opportunities;
  • Support course registration;
  • Enroll individuals in educational, research, wellness, and other programs;
  • Perform administrative tasks;
  • Evaluate applications for employment and maintain personnel files;
  • Support our educational mission;
  • Publicize students’ academic and career success;
  • Send information about other Gettysburg offerings which may be of interest;
  • Process donations; and
  • Other similar uses.

We do not sell personal information to third parties. However, we may share your information with third parties and vendors under contract with us to perform the functions listed above. We may also share your personal information with other third parties to:

  • Respond to lawful requests or legal process, including in response to law enforcement requirements;
  • Protect personal or public safety or to prevent illegal activities; or
  • Protect our own rights, including enforcing our own policies and contracts.

We may also use anonymous or pseudonymous personal information for internal purposes, such as to track the effectiveness of and improve our courses, programs, and other offerings. We may also share anonymous or pseudonymous data with selected third parties.

How Gettysburg protects personal information

We will take reasonable steps to protect the information we collect from loss, misuse, unauthorized access, disclosure, alteration, or destruction. We also use reasonable efforts to ensure that our Sites are generally available to access information concerning our privacy practices. However, there will be occasions when access to the Sites will be interrupted or unavailable. We will use reasonable efforts to minimize such disruption where it is within our reasonable control. You agree that Gettysburg shall not be liable to you for any modification, suspension, or discontinuance of the Sites.

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 Sites, 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 Sites. 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 Sites.

Data retention

We keep your personal information for as long as needed to fulfill the particular purpose for which it is collected. We may also retain your records if legally required or to fulfill a legitimate interest.

Rights for individuals in the European Economic Area

If you reside in a member state of either the European Union or European Free Trade Association that is a party to the European Economic Area (“EEA”) Agreement, you have the right to access personal information that Gettysburg has collected about you for the purpose of reviewing, modifying, correcting, or requesting erasure of your information. You may also have the right to request a copy of your information. Further, you may also request that Gettysburg restrict or stop processing your information.

To the extent applicable, the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (“GDPR”) provides further information about your rights. You also have the right to lodge complaints with your national or regional data protection authority.

If you wish to exercise these rights, please contact us at the address included under the “Contact” section, below. To protect the personal information that Gettysburg holds, we may also request further information to verify your identity when exercising these rights. Upon a request to erase information, we will maintain a core set of personal information to ensure we do not contact you inadvertently in the future, as well as any information necessary for archival or other legal purposes. We may also retain financial information for legal purposes, including compliance with the United States Internal Revenue Service. Additionally, in the event of an actual or threatened legal claim, we may retain your information for purposes of establishing, defending against, or exercising your or our rights with respect to such claim.

By providing information directly to us, you consent to the transfer of personal information to the United States, and potentially to other countries outside of the EEA. You understand that the current laws of countries outside of the EEA may not provide the same level of protection as the data protection laws of the EEA. Nonetheless, we will take all reasonable steps to protect your privacy in accordance with the applicable data protection laws.

You are under no statutory or contractual obligation to provide any personal information to us.

Contact information

To report any issues or concerns, or to contact Gettysburg with any questions regarding this Privacy Policy, email dataprivacy@gettysburg.edu.