Privacy Policy

Information Collection and Use

Applied Simulation Corporation is the sole owner of the information collected on this site. We will not sell, share, or rent this information to others, except as disclosed in this statement. Applied Simulation Corporation collects information from our users at several different points on our website.

Registration and Ordering

In order to use portions of this website, a user must first complete the registration form. During registration, a user is required to give their contact information (such as name and email address) and biographical information (like age and ethnicity). Contact and biographical information are used to contact the user about the services (like assessment results) on our site for which they have expressed an interest, and to track general trends across specified user subgroups to ensure compliance with government standards. If we or the user has trouble completing and assessment or viewing/interpreting their results, contact information is used to get in touch with the user.

Cookies

A cookie is a piece of data stored on the user's hard drive containing information about the user. Once the user closes their browser, the cookie simply terminates. For instance, by setting a cookie on our site, the user would not have to log in a password more than once, thereby saving time while on our site. If a user rejects the cookie, they may still use our site. Cookies can also enable us to track and target the interests of our users to enhance the experience on our site.

Sharing

We will share individual assessment results with those partners specified by the user who will provide teacher education/training products and services for the purpose of professional development and/or teacher certification. We will share aggregated demographic information and assessment trend results with our partners and with selected education and government agencies. This is not linked to any personal information that can identify any individual person. In part, this information is used to demonstrate compliance with governmental rules and standards. We use an outside shipping company to ship orders, and a credit card processing company to bill users for goods and services. These companies do not retain, share, store or use personally identifiable information for any secondary purposes. We may partner with another party to provide specific services. When the user signs up for these services we will share names, or other contact information that is necessary for the third party to provide these services, These parties are not allowed to use personally identifiable information except for the purpose of providing these services.

Tell-A-Friend

A user elects to use our referral service for informing a friend about our site, we ask them for the friends name and email address. Applied Simulation Corporation will automatically send the friend a one-time email inviting them to visit the site. Applied Simulation Corporation stores this information for the sole purpose of sending this one-time email. The friend may contact Applied Simulation Corporation to request the removal of this information from the database.

Links

This web site contains links to other sites. Please be aware that we at Applied Simulation Corporation are not responsible for the privacy practices of such other sites. We encourage our users to be aware when they leave our site and to read the privacy statements of each and every web site that collects personally identifiable information. This privacy statement applies solely to information collected by this Web site.

Surveys, Contests and Newsletters

From time-to-time our site requests information from users via surveys, contests or to solicit subscription to a newsletter. Participation in the surveys, contests or newsletter subscriptions is completely voluntary and the user therefore has a choice whether or not to disclose this information. Information requested may include contact information (such as name and shipping address), and demographic information (such as zip code, age level). Contact information will be used to notify the winners and award prizes. Survey information will be used for purposes of monitoring or improving the use and satisfaction of this site, as well as to explore issues related to teacher professional development, teaching skills assessment, and alternatives to teacher certification.

Security

This website takes every precaution to protect our users' information. When users submit sensitive information via the website, your information is protected both online and off-line. When our registration/order form asks users to enter sensitive information (such as credit card number and/or social security number), that information is encrypted and is protected with the best encryption software in the industry - SSL. While on a secure page, such as our order form, the lock icon on the bottom of Web browsers such as Netscape Navigator and Microsoft Internet Explorer becomes locked, as opposed to un-locked, or open, when you are just surfing. While we use SSL encryption to protect sensitive information online, we also do everything in our power to protect user-information off-line. All of our users' information, not just the sensitive information mentioned above, is restricted in our offices. Only employees who need the information to perform a specific job (for example, our billing clerk or a customer service representative) are granted access to personally identifiable information. If you have any questions about the security at our website, you can send an email.

Choice/Opt-out

Our users are given the opportunity to 'opt-out' of having their information used for specific purposes, for example to stop receiving our newsletter. The "opt -out' capability involves writing the term 'unsubscribe' in the subject line in the email or email us. Users of our site are always notified when their information is being collected by any outside parties. We do this so our users can make an informed choice as to whether they should proceed with services that require an outside party, or not.

Notification of Changes

If we decide to change our privacy policy, we will post those changes on our Homepage so our users are always aware of what information we collect, how we use it, and under circumstances, if any, we disclose it. If at any point we decide to use personally identifiable information in a manner different from that stated at the time it was collected, we would notify users by way of an email. Users will have a choice as to whether or not we use their information in this different manner. We will use information in accordance with the privacy policy under which the information was collected.