FERPA

How Greta thinks about FERPA.

Last updated: July 15, 2026 · v1.1 (alpha)

Plain reading: Greta is a personal tool teachers buy for their own practice. It is not a school-contracted system. Some teacher-kept observational notes may resemble the notes a teacher keeps in a paper notebook. Whether a record fits FERPA’s sole-possession exclusion depends on how it is kept and accessed; this page does not make a categorical legal determination for every note, voice memo, draft, or backup stored with a service provider.

The short version

• Greta is not a “school official” under FERPA.
• Greta does not store official education records (transcripts, grades of record, IEPs, disciplinary files, attendance records).
• FERPA’s §1232g(a)(4)(B)(i) definition describes an exclusion for records of instructional, supervisory, and administrative personnel and educational personnel ancillary thereto which are kept in the sole possession of the maker thereof and which are not accessible or revealed to any other person except a substitute. Because Greta is a service provider, this page does not classify every record stored in Greta as meeting that exclusion.
• We treat your notes with FERPA-equivalent care anyway: limited access, encryption, no third-party disclosure without your direction, and your right to contact us about a copy or deletion request.

What this means in practice

You don’t need district approval to use Greta.

Greta is a personal subscription, like a Moleskine or a productivity app you pay for yourself. Your district doesn’t need to sign a data processing agreement with us because we are not processing data on the district’s behalf — we are providing a personal tool to you.

You shouldn’t use Greta to store official records.

Anything that belongs in your district’s SIS, gradebook, or special education platform should stay there. Greta rejects SSNs, full dates of birth, and student ID numbers as data fields. Greta also rejects free-text medical-diagnosis fields. If you try to enter them, Greta will redirect you to the appropriate system.

If your district asks, here’s what you can tell them.

• Greta is a personal teacher productivity tool.
• Notes stored in Greta are intended for teacher-kept observational use, but this page does not make a categorical legal determination about every record.
• No data is shared with third parties for marketing or training.
• The teacher can request a JSON copy or start account deletion from Settings → Profile → Account data, or contact privacy@teachgreta.com. Requests sent by email must be verified before any action; this page does not promise a response time.
• Sub binders Greta generates for substitute teachers fall within FERPA’s “or to a substitute” clause and contain only what the substitute needs to run the day.

If your district has further questions, have them email privacy@teachgreta.comand we’ll respond directly.

What Greta is working toward

We are not currently SOC 2 certified, and we don’t hold state-specific data agreements (NDPA, etc.). When we pursue school-purchased deals (v3+), we will obtain those certifications. Until then, Greta is a tool for individual teachers, not for districts.

One last note

We’re not your lawyers. This page describes how we think about FERPA and how Greta is designed. If your district has specific policies or your state has stricter rules (California, New York, Illinois, and a few others go beyond FERPA), follow those. When in doubt, ask your district’s privacy officer.

Contact

FERPA questions: privacy@teachgreta.com.