Privacy and Terms

Privacy Policy

Effective date February 28, 2025

INTRODUCTION

At Ethos School ('the company', 'we', or 'us'), we respect your privacy and are committed to protecting it as described in this privacy policy ('Policy' or the 'Privacy Policy'). This policy describes the types of information we may collect from you or that you may provide when you use our product, TrekAI ('the product', 'the service', 'the website', 'the app', or 'product'), and our practices for collecting, using, maintaining, protecting, and disclosing that information. Your use of the Product and Services and any information you provide on the Services are subject to the terms of this Privacy Policy, which is incorporated into and subject to our Terms of Service.

Personal information that we collect

Data Collection

For the purpose of this policy, Personal Information is defined as information that identifies, relates to, or could reasonably be linked with or describes an individual or household, either directly or indirectly. We collect Personal Information you provide to us, as well as Personal Information collected automatically and from third-party sources as described below.

• Data you provide to us: To use our Products and Services, you are required to create an account. During the account creation process, we will collect certain information to establish and manage your account effectively. This information includes first name, last name, email address, and optionally gender. In addition, we collect information created or uploaded to the product by users. This can include student records uploaded by teachers or administrators and any information entered into the product by users.
• Data from third party sources: We allow teachers and administrators to add information about students and classes directly into the product manually or via third party tools such as Edlink. The data collected from these tools, including information provided by teachers, administrators, and all student records, is used solely for the purpose of delivering and supporting the service.
• Data collected automatically: When you use our services, we may use cookies and similar technologies to deliver the services and better understand how you use the product. For more information on cookies and similar technologies, please see the Cookies and Similar Technologies section below.
• Data Ownership: TrekAI acknowledges that all personally identifiable information (PII) about students, teachers, administrators, and parents is the property of the users.
  
  

How We Use Your Information

We limit the data we process and collect from users of the product and students to only what is required to deliver the services. This includes:

• Service delivery (such as provide, operate and improve the service and our business, review, screen and monitor user created content.)
• Security and safety
• Research and analytics of our service
• Compliance with applicable laws
• Send communications and help you use the service better

TrekAI utilizes large language model technology to support student learning and save teachers time in the classroom. The platform provides insights from student chat sessions to their respective teachers, enabling more effective use of classroom time. Account administrators have the authority to manage and activate user accounts and assign chat sessions to designated users. Teachers can assign tasks to students; however, their access is limited to students within their assigned classes, as determined by the account administrator. The service does not allow interactions between unauthorized users, nor does it enable external sharing or posting of information. To support the safety and educational experience of student users, we review and monitor chat content generated within our platform.

Our service is free of advertising, including contextual and personalized ads. We do not collect or process personal information for the purpose of tracking users for targeted advertising. Additionally, we do not solicit user participation in third-party sweepstakes, contests, or promotional activities. We may contact administrator or teachers users directly to provide guidance on how to better utilize the product and to inform them about our services.

How We Share Your Information

As part of providing our services, we may share data with third party vendors who process information to help us provide our services. This includes analytics, and app functionality. We establish contractual limitations with third party vendors that restrict the extent and purposes for which they may process any personal information we disclose to them. These third parties are permitted to process personal information solely on our behalf and in accordance with our instructions. They are also required to implement and maintain security measures that provide a level of protection equivalent to those we uphold. You can view the vendors we use to process data, and the purposes for which they are used to provide our product, below.

• io (https://sentry.io/privacy/): Used for bug tracking and reporting
• Posthog (https://posthog.com/privacy): Tracking user behavior on the platform to improve product experience
• OpenAI (https://openai.com/enterprise-privacy/): Product chat functionality
• Anthropic (https://www.anthropic.com/legal/privacy) : Product chat functionality
• Digital Ocean (https://digitalocean-legal.nyc3.cdn.digitaloceanspaces.com/): Web hosting service
  
  

For the avoidance of doubt, we never sell personal data from our service and we do not share data with third parties for their own marketing, advertising purposes, or creating advertising profiles.

We do not display your personal information that you have submitted to us or that we have collected in the product. This does not prevent users from posting their own personal information through social features or otherwise.

In the event of a merger, acquisition, or bankruptcy user information may be transferred to an acquiring third party. Third-parties with access to personal information are required to provide the same security protections as those we uphold.

We may disclose information, including personal information, if we have a good faith belief that doing so is necessary to comply with the law, such as complying with a subpoena or other legal obligation.

Your Choices

To use our Products and Services, users are required to create an account. During the account creation process, we will collect certain information to establish and manage your account effectively. Your account enables you to personalize your experience, monitor your activities, and control your personal data and any information you provide to us. Certain account controls may be accessible only to account administrators.

When student data is provided to us through a third party tool such as Edlink, access, modification, or deletion of that data may be managed through those tools. We recommend contacting the school or district that administers your student’s data for any such requests.

We do not contact parents, teachers, or administrators for our own direct marketing. However, we may contact administrator or teachers users directly to provide guidance on how to better utilize the product and to inform them about our services. You can stop receiving email communications from us by clicking “unsubscribe” in such communications or contacting us directly. We make every effort to promptly process all unsubscribe requests.

Other Sites and Services

The service may contain links to websites, mobile applications, and other online services operated by third parties. These links are not an endorsement of, or representation that we are affiliated with, any third party. In addition, our content may be included on web pages or in mobile applications or other online services that are not associated with us. We do not control websites, mobile applications or online services operated by third parties, and we are not responsible for their actions. We encourage our users to read the privacy policies of each website and application with which they interact. We do not endorse, screen or approve, and are not responsible for, the privacy practices or content of such other websites or applications

Cookies and Similar Technologies

Our Product may use cookies or similar technologies to help you personalize your online experience. A cookie is a text file that is placed on your device browser that stores preferences to facilitate and enhance your experience. For example, if you register with our Product or Services, a cookie helps our product to recall your specific information on subsequent visits. For clarity, we do not use third-party cookies on our service for personalized advertising or to track users and display personalized advertisements on other third-party websites or services. You can find a list of the types of first and third party cookies we use below:

Necessary cookies: Enable the core operation of our Products and Services and cannot be switched off in our systems. They include cookies that we use to help control secure areas of our site and to make sure it is accessible to you. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not work as a result.

Preference cookies — Also known as “functionality cookies,” these cookies allow a website to remember choices you have made in the past, like what language you prefer, or what your username and password are so you can automatically log in.

Analytics cookies — These cookies collect information about how you use a website, like which pages you visited and which links you clicked on. Their sole purpose is to improve how our website functions. This includes cookies from third-party analytics services as long as the cookies are for the exclusive use of the owner of the website visited.

We use cookies or similar technologies from the following third parties:

• Posthog (https://posthog.com/privacy): Analytics

We do not track our users across third party websites to provide targeted advertising and therefore do not respond to Do Not Track (DNT) signals from web browsers.

Most browsers let you remove or stop accepting cookies from the websites you visit. To do this, follow the instructions in your browser’s settings. Many browsers accept cookies by default until you change your settings. If you do not accept cookies, however, you may not be able to access all features of the services or they may not work properly. For more information about cookies, including how to see what cookies have been set on your browser and how to manage and delete them, visit https://allaboutcookies.org/how-to-manage-cookies.

Security

We are dedicated to safeguarding the security of information obtained through the services, including personal information. When we collect information from you, we implement reasonable and appropriate administrative, technical, and physical safeguards to help protect it from unauthorized access, use, or disclosure. For example, all data is encrypted in transit and at rest and we offer multi-factor account protection to our users. Access to data is strictly limited to authorized personnel on a need-to-know basis, and all access is governed by role-based permissions. Additionally, developers and other team members, including those from Trek, are required to use multi-factor authentication (MFA) wherever applicable to further strengthen account and system security. We follow data minimization principles and retain personal information only as long as necessary to fulfill the purposes for which it was collected or to meet legal and regulatory requirements.

Despite our best efforts, no security controls are entirely risk free, and we cannot guarantee that your information will be secure in all circumstances. In the event of a data breach, we will make reasonable efforts to notify affected users in accordance with applicable laws and regulations.

We maintain a data retention policy to establish clear guidelines on the lifecycle management of our data, ensure compliance with legal and regulatory requirements, and demonstrate a commitment to responsible and transparent data management practices within our organization. Personal Data that we collect will be deleted when it is no longer necessary to provide you with our services. We will delete personal data upon account cancellation or termination. If you would like to delete or terminate your account, you can submit a request by contacting us at info@ethosschool.org. In some cases, we may retain Personal Data beyond the length of time that you have an account with us in order to resolve disputes, comply with legal and compliance obligations, or otherwise. When we enter into a direct agreement with a school or school district, our data retention practices may be governed by the requirements set forth by our contract with that institution. Anonymized data, which is no longer attached to you personally, may be retained for longer periods of time.

GDPR

For users in the EEA and UK, we are headquartered in the United States and may use service providers that operate in other countries. Your personal information may be transferred to the United States or other locations where privacy laws may not be as protective as those in your state, province, or country.

Depending on the purpose for collecting your information, we may rely on one of the following legal bases to process personal information:

• Legitimate Interests: Ethos School processes personal data for purposes related to providing and improving its services, ensuring security, and enhancing user experience.
• Consent: We process personal data when we have obtained the user's explicit consent to do so.

European data protection laws give individuals in Europe the following rights regarding their personal information:

Right of access: You can ask us to provide you with information about our processing of your Personal Information and give you access to your personal information.

Right to rectification: If the personal information we hold about you is inaccurate or incomplete, you are entitled to request to have it rectified.

Right to erasure: You can ask us to delete or remove your personal information where there is no lawful reason for us continuing to store or process it, where you have successfully exercised your right to object to processing (see below), where we may have processed your information unlawfully or where we are required to erase your personal information to comply with local law.

Right to restrict processing: You can ask us to suspend the processing of your personal information:

• if you want us to establish the information’s accuracy;
• where our use of the information proves to be unlawful, but you do not want us to erase it;
• where you need us to hold the information even if we no longer require it as you need it to establish, exercise or defend legal claims; or
• if you have objected to our use of your information but we need to verify whether we have overriding legitimate grounds to use it.

Right to object: You can object to our processing of your personal information where we are relying on a legitimate interest (or those of a third party) to do so and you believe it impacts your fundamental rights and freedoms. You have the right to object at any time to the processing of your personal information for direct marketing purposes. Please note that we do not currently engage in direct marketing.

Right to data portability: You have the right, in certain circumstances, to ask us to provide to you, or a third party you have chosen, your Personal Information in a structured, commonly used, machine-readable format.

Right to withdraw consent at any time: Where we are relying on consent to process your Personal Information you have the right to withdraw your consent at any time. However, this will not affect the lawfulness of any processing carried out before you withdraw your consent.

Exercising those rights: Please note that some of these rights may be limited where we have an overriding interest or legal obligation to continue to process the personal information or where certain exemptions apply. If we decline your request, we will tell you why, subject to legal restrictions.

To exercise any of these rights, please contact us at info@ethosschool.org. We may request specific information from you to help us confirm your identity and process your request.

If you are not satisfied with our response to a request you make, or how we process your personal information, you can make a complaint to the data protection regulator in your habitual place of residence. For users in the EEA: The contact information for the data protection regulator in your place of residence can be found here: https://edpb.europa.eu/about-edpb/board/members_en

United States Privacy

Except as otherwise provided, this section applies to residents of states where they have privacy laws applicable to us that grant their residents the rights described below.

For purposes of this section, “personal information” has the meaning given to “personal data”, “personal information” or similar terms under the applicable privacy laws of the state in which you reside. Please note that not all rights listed below may be afforded to all users and that if you are not a resident of the relevant states, you may not be able to exercise these rights. In addition, we may not be able to process your request if you do not provide us with sufficient detail to allow us to confirm your identity or understand and respond to it.

In some cases, we may provide a different privacy notice to certain categories of residents of these states, such as job applicants, in which case that notice will apply with respect to the activities it describes instead of this section.

Verification: Upon receipt of your request, we will initiate the identity verification process to confirm that you are the individual for whom we hold information in our system. This verification procedure necessitates your cooperation in supplying relevant information, allowing us to compare it with the details you previously furnished. Depending on the nature of your request, we may request specific information to align with our existing records, or we may reach out to you using a previously provided communication method (such as phone or email). In certain situations, alternative verification methods may be employed based on the circumstances.

Any personal information disclosed in your request will solely be utilized for the purpose of confirming your identity or validating your authority to make the request. We will make every effort to minimize the need for additional information for verification purposes. However, should it be impossible to verify your identity with the existing information in our records, we may request additional details to ensure security and prevent fraud. Any supplementary information you provide for verification will be promptly deleted upon the completion of the verification process.

Authorized Agents: Your authorized agent may be able to make a request on your behalf. However, we may need to verify your authorized agent’s identity and authority to act on your behalf. We may require a copy of a valid power of attorney given to your authorized agent pursuant to applicable law. If you have not provided your agent with such a power of attorney, we may ask you to take additional steps permitted by law to verify that your request is authorized, such as by providing your agent with written and signed permission to exercise your rights on your behalf, the information we request to verify your identity, and confirmation that you have given the authorized agent permission to submit the request.

Access: You can request a copy of the personal information that we have collected about you.
Correction: You can request that we correct inaccurate personal information that we have collected about you.
Deletion: You can request that we delete your personal information. Once we process a deletion request, we may be unable to provide access or support to any past products or services.

Exercising those rights: If you would like to access, modify, correct, or delete your data from our services please contact us at info@ethosschool.org.

Please note that some of these rights may be limited where we have an overriding interest or legal obligation to continue to process the personal information or where certain exemptions apply. If we decline your request, we will tell you why, subject to legal restrictions. Be advised that the student data that we process on behalf of schools and educators may remain under the control of the respective school. To request access to, modification of, or deletion of student records, please contact the school that maintains those records directly.

Student and Children's Privacy

We comply with the U.S. Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act and Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, and describe our practices regarding the processing of personal information for users under the age of 13 below. Our service is designed to be used by parents, teachers, administrators, and students in an educational context. As part of our services, we may process student records and data from children 13 years of age and under, as provided to us by parents, schools, teachers, and students.

If a user under the age of 13 attempts to sign up with us directly, we require that they provide contact information for their parent or guardian so that we can obtain verifiable parental consent from their parent or guardian to process personal information from the child. When a parent user signs up for the services, we will obtain verifiable parental consent from the parent or guardian before collecting or processing personal information from their children under the age of 13.

When we provide services on behalf of a school, the school provides consent for Ethos School to collect and process information from students under the age of 13 as permitted by the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act. As described in the direct notice we provide to schools, we collect, maintain, use and share student records only for authorized educational purposes.

We are committed to protecting the privacy and data of students and children and do not require more information about students or children than is reasonably necessary to provide the service. In addition:

• We collect, maintain, use and share student records only for an authorized educational purpose.
• We do not use or disclose student records for targeted advertising or any other commercial purposes unrelated to education.
• We do not build a personal profile of a student other than to deliver our service.

Student records that we process on behalf of schools and educators will remain under the control of the respective school. To request access to, modification of, or deletion of student records, please contact the school that maintains those records directly.

Changes To This Privacy Policy

We reserve the right to modify this Privacy Policy at any time. If we make material changes to this Privacy Policy, we will notify you as required by applicable law and we will update the date of this Privacy Policy and post it on the services or other appropriate means.

HOW TO CONTACT US

If you have questions on concerns regarding this Privacy Policy, please contact us using the means described in this section.

Email: info@ethosschool.org
Address:1575 Indian Trail, Norcross, GA, 30093