Regents give students chance to ‘opt out’ of information release

Jennifer Knight

Thursday, March 7, 2002 | 11:08 a.m.

RENO -- The state Board of Regents voted Wednesday to limit the for-profit practice of releasing student information to credit card companies, but ACLU officials said the changes did not go far enough in protecting students' rights.

They said they will take their fight to the Legislature.

"This isn't the last of the debate," said Kendall Stagg, the Northern Nevada coordinator for the American Civil Liberties Union. "We'll hear more on this issue in the Legislature."

The state's two universities along with the Community College of Southern Nevada cut deals with credit card companies to supply the names and addresses of students, faculty and parents. In exchange each institution received a cut of the proceeds from student credit purchases.

The board voted 8-3 to require all of Nevada's institutions to prominently publish information on how students can "opt out" of having their information released. The new policy also prohibits institutions from profiting off of such lists.

ACLU officials sought more stringent requirements, such as a mandatory "opt-in" rule that would automatically keep student information private unless otherwise stated.

"The burden to opt out should not be on the students," Stagg told regents in Reno. "It does not send the right message to the community when our institutions of higher learning are playing the system."

But had the ACLU-backed policy been approved, school officials said, it would have thrown the good solicitations out with the bad.

"What they will miss is access to external scholarship, honors societies, Who's Who, health insurance options, fee payment plan information, graduation programs," University of Nevada, Las Vegas President Carol Harter said. "Opt in leaves us with the options where many many students will miss very many valuable opportunities. The opt out helps us solve that problem."

Regent Laura Lopez Hobbs, who was attending her first meeting, said students should take responsibility for themselves.

"We may be overprotecting here," Hobbs said. "Students can get credit cards regardless of whether they are with us or not."