U.S. Education Dept. updates student privacy rules.

• Position: PRIVACY - Department of Education

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

The U.S. Department of Education has implemented new regulations meant to clarify when universities can release confidential information about students. The move is meant to reassure school officials that the government will not second-guess their decisions to share information about students who may be at risk of harming themselves or others, according to The Wall Street Journal.

The move stems from the April 2007 massacre at Virginia Tech, in which a mentally ill student killed 32 people before killing himself. A panel appointed by Virginia Gov. Timothy M. Kaine found that confusion over privacy laws prevented university administrators from sharing details about the perpetrator's troubling prior behavior with authorities or his parents.

According to The Journal, the new regulations represent the most comprehensive reworking of the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA), the federal law enacted in 1974 to protect students' privacy, in two decades.

"What we are attempting to do is to strike a balance on the privacy-safety issue and reassure schools that safety is paramount when it comes to educational institutions," LeRoy Rooker, director of the Department of Education's family policy...