Overview

Prince Sultan University’s data must be protected throughout its life cycle consistently in a manner appropriate to its importance, wherever it is stored or what purpose it serves.

Purpose

The purpose of this policy is to establish clear guidelines for all staff members to follow in reference to data access and to maintain the privacy of the information of all the stakeholders involved.

Scope

The policy applies to all academic and non-academic departments at PSU.

Policy

Due to the increasing demand to access data from different departments, units and centers for various reasons, and to maintain privacy of information and control of confidential data, the following are important rules:

• All PSU academic, financial, and administrative data stored in any format including student, faculty, staff, policies, and, regulations is the sole property of PSU. None of the PSU data should be shared with any parties outside PSU except with the written approval of the Rector.
• Access to, the use of, and the sharing of any of the PSU data inside PSU should be restricted only to the authorized administrative or faculty members, and should be used for the intended purpose only. This includes the following:
• An individual faculty member has full access and authority to review and obtain only his/her Course Evaluation Survey results for all courses taught in all semesters.
• Academic departments’ leaders (Chairperson, Associate Chairs, Deans, Vice deans) have full access and authority to review and obtain faculty members’ Course Evaluation Survey results only for faculty at their respective colleges.
• Academic departments’ leaders (Chairperson, Associate Chairs Deans, Vice-deans, coordinators) have full access and authority to review and obtain students’ transcripts, academic status, transactions, and attendance, only for students studying at one of the programs in their respective colleges.
• Academic advisers have full access and authority to review and obtain students’ transcripts, academic status, transactions, and attendance only for students on their advising list.
• Teachers do not have the right to request any confidential information about their students—including transcripts, academic status, transactions, and attendance. Deanship of Student Affairs and the Scholarship Center have full access and authority to review and obtain students’ transcripts, academic status, transactions, and attendance of all active students at PSU.
• All academic departments have full access and authority to review statistical reports about admission, registration, scheduling, classrooms assignments, and graduates of their academic programs.
• The Deanship of Student Affairs has full access and authority to review and obtain data about current PSU students and PSU alumni.
• The Evaluation and Academic Accreditation Center and the Center of Statistical Information have full access and authority to review and obtain statistical reports about admission, registration, scheduling, classrooms assignments, and graduates. This
• includes aggregated data and all anonymous statistical reports. However, any confidential data about individual faculty or staff members or student members or individual students could be requested only upon the written approval from higher management. Even in this case, the confidential data about individual faculty or staff members or students including their performance evaluation results should not be disclosed.
• All administrative units/centers have the right to request, in writing, aggregate statistical reports about admission, registration, scheduling, classrooms assignments, and graduates. These requests must not include any confidential data about individual faculty or staff members or individual students. However, confidential data can be requested with the written approval of the Rector.

The above rules and regulations as set out in the policy aim to support PSU’s privacy policy and ensure that confidential data are used only for their designed purposes.