Privacy Policy for VAPPA

At the Virginia Chapter of APPA, or VAPPA, we respect the privacy of our members, program participants, those who use and visit our Websites, and our community. This Privacy Policy provides the privacy principles that we follow with respect to how we collect, use and protect the information that you may provide through the use of VAPPA’s Website (virginia-appa.org), as well as through other channels, such as at our events you may attend.

Please read this entire Privacy Policy before using VAPPA’s Website or submitting information to VAPPA though this Website or other submission channels.

VAPPA’s mission and purpose; legitimate interests
VAPPA’s mission is to create positive impact in educational facilities by transforming individual facilities professionals into higher performing managers and leaders, transforming member institutions into supportive learning environments, and elevating the recognition and value of educational facilities. As such, any information we collect serves to further our mission, including but not limited to the following:

  • Provide relevant information to our prospective members, active members, our community, and the public
  • Respond to inquiries relating to VAPPA and educational facilities
  • Promote VAPPA, regional, and chapter events, programs, and activities
  • Perform our contractual obligations with members in good standing, participants of our certification program, registered attendees at our events, and subscribers of our publications and other products/services

What information does VAPPA collect?
You can access some areas of the Website without submitting any personally identifiable information to us. However, if you wish to access additional content available on this Website or participate in some of VAPPA’s activities, we may ask that you provide us personally identifiable information for the purposes described below. Most data VAPPA collects is used only to help VAPPA better serve its members and prospective members. It is our general policy to collect and store only personal information that our members and visitors voluntarily provide. Such information is generally requested and provided when you:

  • Join VAPPA as a member or renew membership with VAPPA
  • Register for meetings, trainings, or other VAPPA programs
  • Purchase VAPPA products or services
  • Create a Website account
  • Contact VAPPA

We maintain this information for our internal processes only. VAPPA Internet forms often require users to give us contact information that may include name, email address, format preference, address, interests, and similar information. VAPPA does not disclose credit card information provided by its members and customers. When members and customers choose to pay using their credit cards, VAPPA submits the information needed to the appropriate clearinghouse through secure payment gateway sites to conduct the transactions.

When you visit the Website, we collect and store certain other information automatically that may not identify you personally:

  • Internet Protocol (IP) address. An IP address is a number that is automatically assigned to the computer you are using whenever you access the Internet
  • Type of browser and operating system used to access our Website
  • Date and time you access our Website
  • The pages on our Website that you access

We use the foregoing information in the form of summary statistics to help us make our Website more useful to our visitors, such as assessing what information is of most and least interest. In addition, there may be times when we share de-identified, aggregate information—such as the number of hits per page—with our partners and with advertisers, sponsors, and other third parties in an effort to customize or enhance the content and advertising on the Website for our users.

How does VAPPA protect your information?
We use industry-recognized security safeguards, coupled with security procedures that protect your information from loss, misuse or unauthorized alteration. When we ask for sensitive information, such as credit card numbers, we encrypt it as it is transmitted to us.

When you submit information to VAPPA through our Website, you should be aware that your information is transmitted across the Internet and that no method of transmission over the Internet is 100% secure. Although we take reasonable security measures to protect your information when we receive it, you also need to ensure you take appropriate steps to protect your information.

How does VAPPA use information collected?
When we ask you for information, we tell you, or it will be clear, what we need to fulfill your request and how we will use it. We use information for purposes of administering our business activities and providing services. We provide membership lists to carefully selected business partners as a member benefit. However, we do not otherwise make your personal information available to anyone outside of VAPPA for any marketing purpose or sell or rent your personal information to third-parties for any other purposes, except in response to subpoenas or for other legal reasons.

How to update your information
You may access, correct, and update your personal information by logging in your Website account and utilize the update account function. Upon request to APPA via postal mail, email, or telephone (during regular business hours), VAPPA will provide you with a summary of any personally identifiable information retained by VAPPA about you, so you may modify, correct, change, or update personally identifiable information that VAPPA has collected through its Website. We may ask you to provide sufficient evidence of your identity for your own protection so we can ensure that information is being released to the correct person.

Will VAPPA disclose my information?
VAPPA does not disclose your personally identifiable information to third-parties, aside from VAPPA’s carefully selected business partners and vendors acting as an agent of VAPPA for operational support purposes, including but not limited to event registration, content management and analysis, system maintenance, email distribution, printing, and mailing. Notwithstanding the foregoing, VAPPA may disclose your personally identifiable information as follows:

We may disclose your information to VAPPA’s agents and advisors (such as our accountants and attorneys). We will only disclose the personal information necessary for them to provide their services to you or us, and only under strict confidentiality restrictions.

We may disclose your information as VAPPA believes in good faith is necessary to: (a) comply with the law (including but not limited to court and government orders and civil subpoenas); (b) enforce or apply our Terms of Use and other agreements; (c) protect the rights, property, or safety of VAPPA, our Website visitors, or others; or (d) investigate fraud, potentially illegal activity, or respond to a government/legal request, and may do so even without a subpoena, warrant, or other court order, to the extent we feel necessary to inform or cooperate with law enforcement agencies or other appropriate authorities.

In addition, in the event of a merger, acquisition, or any form of sale or transfer of some or all of our assets to a third party, we may also disclose your personal information to the third parties concerned or their professional advisors. In the event of such a transaction, the personal information held by VAPPA will be among the assets subject to the transaction.

What technology is used on VAPPA’s websites?
We use a variety of technologies on our Websites. Among these are cookies—pieces of information that our Website provides to your browser when you visit our Website. Cookies allow us to track overall site usage and determine areas users prefer, and also allow us to make your visit to our Website easier by recognizing you when you return and helping to provide you with a customized experience. You can choose to decline cookies while at our Websites; however, this may limit your ability to access certain areas of the Website. Most browsers accept and maintain cookies by default. Check the “Help” menu of your browser to learn how to change your cookie preferences.

Our Websites tracks usage data, including, for example, your IP address, your browser type and version, which pages you view, which page, if any, linked you to our sites, and which link, if any, you follow off of our sites. We use this data in the aggregate to better understand Website activity to improve our site offerings. We do not track URLs that you type into your browser, nor do we track you across the Internet once you leave our site. By using our Websites, you consent to the collection and use of this information by VAPPA, as outlined herein. We may access and set cookies using web beacons, also known as single-pixel GIFs, which are invisible graphical images. These web beacons provide us useful information regarding our site, such as which pages users’ access. When we send you emails, we may include a single-pixel GIF to allow us to determine the number of people who open our emails. When you click on a link in an email, we record this individual response to allow us to customize our offerings to you.

Links to third-party websites and third-party websites linked to our websites
Our Websites may contain links to other Internet Websites or other Websites may contain links to our Websites. Unless we explicitly state otherwise, we have no control over these third-party sites and their privacy practices, information or content contained therein. This Privacy Policy applies only to information you supply (or what we collect) in connection with the use of our Websites. Upon visiting any third-party Website to which we may provide a link or third-party Websites linked to our Websites, you should review the privacy policy specific to that site.

Children’s information
The Website is not intended for children under 13 years of age. VAPPA does not knowingly collect personal information from children under 13 years of age. If VAPPA discovers that a child under the age of 13 has provided us with personal data, we will delete the child’s personal data unless a parent or guardian provides verifiable consent to VAPPA.

International website access and cross-border data transfers
Our principal place of operation is in the United States. If you are visiting the Website from outside the United States, your information will be transferred to, stored, and processed in the United States where our servers are located and VAPPA is based. In addition, information that VAPPA collects may be stored and processed in and transferred between any of the countries in which the Association operates to enable the use of the information in accordance with this Privacy Policy. You agree to such cross-border transfers of personal information.

Social media widgets
The Website includes social media features, including the Facebook Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, and Instagram icons, that run on our Website. These features may collect your Internet Protocol address and which page you are visiting on our Website, and may set a cookie to enable the feature to function properly. Social media features and widgets are either hosted by a third party or hosted directly on our Site. Your interactions with these features are governed by the privacy policy of the company providing it.

Amendments and updates
VAPPA reserves the right to amend this Privacy Policy at any time. If we decide to change our Privacy Policy, we will post these changes on our homepage so that you are always aware of what information we collect, how we use it, and under what circumstances, if any, we disclose it. Any such change will be effective immediately upon posting. We encourage you to periodically review this page for the latest information on our privacy practices and this Privacy Policy.

You can contact VAPPA with questions about our privacy practice and this Privacy Policy at:

VAPPA
PO Box 400429
180 McCormick Road
Charlottesville, Virginia 22904
vappaboard@virginia-appa.org

Effective Date: August 2022.
Note: This Privacy Policy was adopted from VAPPA’s parent organization APPA (www.appa.org) with its permission.

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