RESOURCES

Safety & Security

STUDENT PRIVACY ACT (FERPA)

Educational records are kept by the college to facilitate the educational development of students. The law defines education records as: “Educational records are those records which: (1) are directly related to a student, and (2) are maintained by an educational agency or institution.” Faculty and staff members may also keep informal records relating to their functional responsibilities with individual students.

The School of Urban Missions is subject to the provisions of the federal law known as the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA). This Act guarantees students, parents, and guardian’s access to certain educational records and restricts the college in the area of release and disclosure of those records to third parties. The college releases no information to third parties except as noted below or upon receipt of an original signed request by the student. The college accords all the rights under the law to students who are declared independent.

The Act provides that information may be released to personnel within the institution, to officials of other institutions at which the student wishes to enroll, to persons or organizations providing student financial aid, to accrediting agencies carrying out their function, in compliance with a judicial order, and to persons in an emergency in order to protect the health and safety of students or others. All SUM students are asked to sign a FERPA Agreement with SUM upon enrolling in the college which indicates whether the student permits the College to give out directory information about a students attendance and graduation. For more information concerning FERPA please visit: http://www.ed.gov/policy/gen/guid/fpco/ferpa/index.htmlor call (202) 260-3887

GRIEVANCE RIGHTS AND PROCEDURE

The College subscribes to the principle of equal educational opportunity, regardless of sex (cf Title IX of Education Amendments of 1972). Any member of the college community who has a grievance related to this principle should petition in writing to the Dean of Academic Affairs, who will work with the petitioner for a resolution of the problem. The Administrative Committee of the college follows guidelines from Matthew 18 and serves as the ultimate board of appeal for any grievances.

SEXUAL HARASSMENT

Harassment of students or colleagues on the basis of sex is a violation of law and will not be tolerated by the college. Such harassment is defined as requests for sexual favors and other verbal or physical conduct of a sexual nature which constitute sexual harassment when a person creates an intimidating, hostile, or offensive learning environment.

SAFETY INCIDENT REPORTING

SUM encourages the victims and witnesses of all criminal activities and safety violations to report those incidents to the appropriate Department and to the local authorities.

Criminal activity should be reported to the appropriate authorities and this procedure is not intended to replace such reporting.

There are two ways safety incident reports may be generated: 1) on campus; and 2) student housing.

On-campus report procedures.

The report was given to the Campus Director and property manager
The campus Director will copy the VP for Cohort Development every report
The VP for Cohort Development will send each report to the SUM Campus Safety Reporter

Student housing report procedures.

The incident should be reported to Resident Director
The Resident Director will forward a copy of the report to the VP of Cohort Development.
The VP of Cohort Development will forward a copy of the report to the SUM Campus Safety Reporter.

CLERY ACT COMPLIANCE

The Jeanne Clery Act (1990, 1998) requires higher education institutions to report crime statistics to current and prospective students and employees. For more information concerning the Jeanne Clery Act please see page 56 of the Student Handbook.