Effective June 1, 2020.
The following Privacy Policy (“Privacy Policy”) governs your use of the Websites and the Services, which are owned by MACTE, Inc. (“MACTE”).
We have created this Privacy Policy to ensure that you understand our policies and procedures relating to privacy, what personal information you must provide if you wish to use certain portions of the Websites and the Services, ultimately, just how we use such personal information.
By accessing or using any of the Websites and the Services, you agree that you have read and agree to be bound by this Privacy Policy.
1. Sites and Site Operator. The sites to which the following Privacy Policy applies are: www.macte.org (collectively, “the Websites”). The operator of the Websites is Montessori Accreditation Council for Teacher Education, 420 Park Street, Charlottesville, VA 22902.
2. Effective Date. This Privacy Policy is effective as of, and was last revised on the date specified above. MACTE reserves the right to add to, delete from and/or otherwise change this Privacy Policy at any time in its sole and absolute discretion. To the maximum extent permitted by law, you are responsible for monitoring the Websites to determine if any changes have been made to the Privacy Policy in the future. Access to and/or use of the Websites and/or the Services by you after the date of any such change shall be deemed to confirm your agreement to be bound by the Privacy Policy then in effect.
3. Information Collected by the Websites. We collect two types of information from users of the Websites: personal information described below; and non-personal information such as information about traffic patterns on the Websites.
4. Personal Information. To access our accreditation management portal (hosted by a third party), we require the submission of an application that may contain some personal data, such as your name and email address. We may then ask for additional information, including personally identifiable and non-personally identifiable information.MACTE uses third parties to process e-check and credit card payments online and never stores or receives access to credit card or bank account information.When you apply for accreditation, we may ask you for certain personal information such as your name, address, and e-mail address, in order to process your application or provide services. Providing personal information in these instances is solely your choice; you do not need to provide such information, make purchases, or enter such contests to browse our Websites as a Visitor.
5. How We Use Your Personal Information. We use the information collected on the Websites for a variety of purposes, including, but not limited to, running the Websites and the Services and contacting users. We may use your information to communicate back to you, to update you on services and benefits, to personalize the Websites for you, to contact you for research or to provide you with accreditation related communications, newsletters, or other information we think would be of particular interest. We will always give you the opportunity to opt out of receiving communications that are not essential to maintaining or receiving accreditation. If you are an applicant or current or previous MACTE accredited program, we will retain the information that you provide upon applying for, renewing or maintaining accreditation. If you have obtained or are in the process of obtaining a credential through a teacher education program accredited by MACTE, we will retain information about you associated with your credential to fulfill our obligations as an accrediting body.
If you request to be included in subject matter or other mailing lists maintained by MACTE for the benefit of its constituents, we will retain the information that you provide for that purpose for so long as the list continues in existence or you tell us that you wish to unsubscribe to that list. You can remove your email address from our email list at any time by following the procedures set forth below (“Opt Out Procedures”) or by clicking on the “unsubscribe” link in every newsletter email from MACTE. In addition, you can modify your information or change your preferences, as set forth below (“Reviewing or Changing Your Information”).
Note that if you pay through a third-party provider (e.g. a service we use to process payments), the terms and conditions and privacy policy on that third party provider’s website will govern the retention of information provided for the purpose of processing payment.
MACTE only shares information with third party providers when it believes the third party is engaged in research or efforts that would be advantageous to MACTE’s constituents. Such third party providers are only given limited access to your electronic or snail-mail contact information or both. Such third parties are also required to comply with applicable European Union and United States regulations regarding opting out from communications.
6. Non-Personal Data. In some cases, we may collect non-personal information. Examples of this type of information include the type of Internet browser you are using, the type of computer operating system application software, and peripherals you are using and the domain name of the web site from which you linked to our Site. We use your information on an aggregated basis to do such things as operate our Websites, enhance our Websites and sell and deliver advertising.
7. Cookies. Certain features on the Websites and/or the Services utilize cookie technology. A cookie is a small data file that certain web sites write to your hard drive when you visit them. A cookie file can contain various types of information, including a user ID that the site uses to track the pages you’ve visited. We may use cookies to enhance your experience on our Websites, to determine user traffic patterns and for other purposes.Most browsers are initially set up to accept cookies; however, you can reset your browser to refuse all cookies or indicate when a cookie is being sent or you can flush your browser of cookies from time to time. (Note: you may need to consult the help area of your browser application for instructions.) If you choose to disable your cookies setting or refuse to accept a cookie, however, you may not be able to access all areas of the Websites and/or the Services.
8. Opt Out Procedures. You have the option to opt out of receiving information from MACTE, the Websites and the Services. This opt out messaging will appear at the bottom of every email that is sent out that is not essential to maintaining or receiving accreditation. If you no longer wish to take advantage of the Websites or the Services or receive any form of direct contact from MACTE, whether it is emails or newsletters contact us at: info@macte.org.
9. Reviewing or Changing Your Information. In order to ensure that the information we maintain is accurate, we give users the option to change or modify their information previously provided during the application or registration. If you would like to change your information currently in our database or accreditation management portal, please email us at info@macte.org.
10. Sharing of Your Information. MACTE may share your personal information: (i) with MACTE’s parent, affiliates, subsidiaries, or successors (collectively the “MACTE Parties”), or with third parties who are under obligations of confidentiality with any of the MACTE Parties, (ii) if a MACTE Party is required by law to do so, (iii) in the event of a transfer of ownership of a MACTE Party, merger or other similar transaction, or (iv) as otherwise set forth in this Privacy Policy.
The following describes some of the ways that your personal information may be disclosed to third parties:
We may employ third parties to perform services or functions on our behalf in order to improve our Websites, accreditation efforts, communications or other services. Those third parties may include authorized contractors, consultants and other companies working with us. They only have access to personal information needed to perform their functions, and they may not share any personal information with others or use it for any other purpose than providing or improving MACTE’s services and offerings.
This Privacy Policy applies only to the Websites and the Services and does not address the practices of third parties who may collect your personal information. You may visit other websites, through links on the Websites, which may collect, use and share your personal information in accordance with their own privacy policies. The information practices of those linked websites are not covered by this Privacy Policy, and we encourage you to be very cautious before you disclose your personal information to others. In order to provide you with the information or services which you have requested, we may share or transfer your personal information with our parent, affiliates or subsidiaries, or third party agents acting on their behalf.
The MACTE Parties may be obligated to cooperate with various law enforcement inquiries. Each MACTE Party reserves the right to disclose or transfer personal information and non-personal information about you and your activities on our Websites in order to comply with a legal requirement or request from law enforcement or other government officials, administrative agencies or third parties as we, in our sole discretion, determine necessary or appropriate for the administration of justice, or in connection with an investigation of fraud, intellectual property infringements or violations of any other law, rule or regulation, our Terms of Use or other rules or policies of our Websites, the rights of third parties, or an investigation of any other activity that may expose us or you to legal liability, or to investigate any suspected conduct which MACTE in its sole discretion deems improper.
11. Security. Providing a secure site is essential for your peace of mind and trust in MACTE. Please see the security policies for our third parties that are used when payments are processed. MACTE never receives nor stores your credit card information.
https://www.jotform.com/security/
https://www.fisglobal.com/en/merchant-solutions-worldpay
12. Children’s Online Privacy Protection Policy. The Websites and the Services are not intended for or directed to users under the age of 18, and we do not knowingly or intentionally collect personally identifiable information from children under the age of 13 or other minors. Where appropriate, we take reasonable measures to determine that our users are adults of legal age and to inform minors not to submit such information to the Websites or the Services or in response to advertisements. If you are concerned that personal information may have been inadvertently provided to or collected by MACTE, please contact us immediately at info@macte.org so that we may appropriate steps to remove such information from our database.
13. Privacy Precaution Warning. Please note that no data transmission over the Internet is 100% secure. As a result, we cannot guarantee the security of the information that you transmit via our online services.
14. Your Consent. By using the Websites and/or the Services, and by providing your personal information to us, you also authorize the storage, use and export of your personal information as specified herein.
15. Applicable Law. The headquarters of MACTE is located in the Commonwealth of Virginia, U.S.A. This Privacy Policy and our legal obligations are subject to the laws of Virginia and the U.S.A., regardless of the location of any user. Any claims or complaints must be filed in a court of competent jurisdiction in the Commonwealth of Virginia, U.S.A.
California “Shine the Light” Law
California’s “Shine the Light” law (Cal. Civ. Code Sections 1798.80, et seq.), adopted effective January 1, 2005, provides California residents with the right to receive certain disclosures when personal information that has been collected online is shared with third parties for direct-marketing purposes.
If you are a California resident and you provided personal information to MACTE through a website in the past, and/or if you do so in the future, you are entitled to submit a request in writing to MACTE for a description of the information we may have provided to third parties. To submit your written request, please send it to info@macte.org and put the following words in the subject line of the email: “California Privacy Request.”
Within 30 days after receipt of your request, we will send you a list of the categories of personal information disclosed to third parties during the immediately preceding calendar year, along with the names and addresses of the third parties who actually received such information, if any.
We reserve our right not to respond to requests sent more than once in a calendar year.
Please note that the California “Shine the Light” law does not cover all aspects of on-line information sharing, and our policy relates only to information covered by the law.
Anti Spam Policy
We do not sell or provide email addresses to any unauthorized third party and do not authorize any third party or affiliate to misuse products or services created by or associated with MACTE in spam or bulk emails. If you feel you have received any unwanted emails from us, please contact us immediately and we will look into the matter.
MACTE prohibits the use of their website and/or services in any manner associated with the transmission, distribution or delivery of any unsolicited bulk or unsolicited commercial e-mail. You may not use any MACTE services to send Spam. You also may not deliver Spam or cause Spam to be delivered to any customers of MACTE.
In compliance with the CAN-SPAM Act of 2003 (15 U.S.C. 7701, et seq., Public Law No. 108-187, was S.877 of the 108th United States Congress), e-mail sent, or caused to be sent, to or through the MACTE website or service or on behalf of MACTE may not:
- use or contain false, misleading, invalid or forged headers
- use deceptive or misleading subject lines
- use or contain invalid or non-existent domain names;
- employ any technique to otherwise misrepresent, hide or obscure any information in identifying the point of origin or the transmission path;
- use other means of deceptive addressing;
- use a third party’s internet domain name, or be relayed from or through a third party’s equipment, without permission of the third party;
- contain false or misleading information in the subject line or otherwise contain false or misleading content;
- fail to comply with additional technical standards described below;
- otherwise violate our Terms of Use.
MACTE does not authorize the harvesting, mining or collection of e-mail addresses or other information from or through the website or its services. MACTE does not permit or authorize others to use the MACTE services to collect, compile or obtain any information about its customers or subscribers, including but not limited to subscriber email addresses. MACTE does not permit or authorize any attempt to use its services in a manner that could damage, disable, overburden or impair any aspect of any of the services, or that could interfere with any other party’s use and enjoyment of any MACTE service.
If MACTE believes that unauthorized or improper use is being made of any service, it may, without notice, take such action as it, in its sole discretion, deems appropriate, including blocking messages from a particular internet domain, mail server or IP address. MACTE may immediately terminate any account on any service which it determines, in its sole discretion, is transmitting or is otherwise connected with any e-mail that violates this policy.
Nothing in this policy is intended to grant any right to transmit or send email to, or through, the MACTE website and/or services. Failure to enforce this policy in every instance does not amount to a waiver of MACTE’s rights.
Unauthorized use of any MACTE services in connection with the transmission of unsolicited e-mail, including the transmission of e-mail in violation of this policy, may result in civil, criminal, or administrative penalties against the sender and those assisting the sender.
Violators of the CAN SPAM Act may be subject to cease and desist orders or penalties from the FTC (Federal Trade Commission) of up to $11,000 per violation. Criminal prosecution is also possible in the case of egregious offenders, which can result in penalties such as fines, forfeiture of proceeds and equipment. The worst offenders can also be subject to prison time.
