Two federal laws govern the confidentiality of students’ educational records: the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) and the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA).

Both FERPA and IDEA apply to charter schools and district public schools. FERPA covers all education records of students enrolled in a charter school and the confidentiality provisions of IDEA apply to a subset of education records of students with disabilities.

Included in the briefing and broken out separately are a series of forms that may be useful in implementing confidentiality policies and procedures. These forms are samples only. While charter schools may use them as part of their policies, schools should feel free to use their own, so long as those forms capture the information required by law.