Homeschool Panda (“HSP”) Privacy Notice

HSP users are our priority and want them to know about all the measure we take to ensure that private information remains private. Learn all about Homeschool Panda's Privacy Policy here.

Welcome to Homeschool Panda, provided by eLearning Solutions, LLC. Homeschool Panda, also referred to as “HSP”, “HSP Mobile Application”, “HSP Web Application”, “Panda Messenger”, “Panda Connect” and/or its affiliates provide website features and other tools and services to you when you visit www.HomeschoolPanda.com or use the HSP mobile application or software provided by Homeschool Panda in connection with any of the foregoing (collectively, "HSP Services"). Homeschool Panda provides the HSP Services subject to the following conditions. HSP knows that you care how information about you is used and shared, and we appreciate your trust, that we will do so carefully, securely and sensibly. We will take all reasonable care with your user (e.g. Parents, Educators, Teachers, Administrators, Care givers, Learners) profile information and always try to put ourselves in your shoes. This notice describes our privacy policy. By visiting the HSP website, signing up for HSP Services, subscribing to any HSP communications (e.g. e-mails, newsletters, notifications, support chat, accepting invites from other HSP users, you are accepting the practices described in this Privacy Notice.

We offer a range of HSP Services, and sometimes additional terms may apply. When you use or access HSP Services (e.g. Panda Connect / Panda Messenger, Community Forum, User Review, Your Content Library, or HSP Mobile App) you may be asked to review and provide consent to the guidelines, terms and agreements, if applicable, for that specific HSP Service ("Service Terms").

What Personal Information About Users Does HSP Gather?

We collect information about you when you provide it to us, when you use our Services.

Required Information – Safety and Privacy when using ‘Panda Connect’

As part of our unwavering commitment to the safety and privacy of our users and their families, we require the following pieces of information for verification of identity: first name, last name, middle initial (if any), city, zip code and state. We collect this information for actively checking against the Department of Justice National Sex Offenders Public Website (NSOPW) database. Users who do not provide this optional information can still access HSP Services, however, will not be allowed to use the ‘Panda Connect’ features. With or without cause and with notice, HSP reserves the final right and discretion for allowing, rejecting, continuing, discontinuing, terminating, suspending and / or disclosure of user accounts.

When using the ‘Panda Connect/Panda Messenger’ features, providing false identity information will lead to, including but not limited to, termination of user account and access to HSP Services, reporting to law enforcement agencies, prosecution and civil lawsuit to recover any damages / harm caused to our users, brand, organization, goodwill and credibility.

What we do with this information

We realize, that sex offenders have always lived in our communities. The Community Protection Act of 1990 enables us to check the NSOPW database and be proactive about avoiding any potential threat to any of our users and their families. Our objective is not to abuse this information, or to threaten, intimidate or harass registered sex offenders. Using the required information, our users feedback and by detecting repeated suspicious, abusive, harassing and / or irregular activities on the HSP Services platforms, we can and will duly take the strictest, swift and legitimate action permissible by law, including but not limited to, termination of user account and access to HSP Services, reporting to law enforcement agencies, prosecution and civil lawsuit to recover any damages / harm caused to our users, brand, organization, goodwill and credibility.

In addition to the above we collect:

  • E-mail address of registered users;
  • The name of the internet domain (for example, "123mycompany.com" if you use a private Internet access account, or "123myschool.edu" if you are connecting from a university's domain);
  • The Internet Protocol (IP) address (a number that is automatically assigned to your computer when you are using the Internet) from which you access our site;
  • The type of browser and operating system used to access our site;
  • The date and time you access our site;
  • The internet address of the website from which you linked directly to our site; and
  • The pages you visit and the information you request;
  • The content and other information you provide when you use HSP Services, including when you sign up for an account, create or share, and message or communicate with others;
  • Your user profile information, such as your name, e-mail address and social media profile / ID information, when you provide us feedback or contact us via e-mail or participate in our polling / survey activities;
  • Media content (e.g. photo, video, audio files) such as the location of a photo or the date a file was created;
  • Information on how you use HSP Services, such as the types of content you view or engage with or the frequency and duration of your activities. This information is used to improve the Site and Services;
  • When you are using the HSP Services, our servers collect information such as your web request, IP address, browser type, referring / exit pages and URLs, number of clicks, domain names, landing pages, pages viewed, and other browsing information;
  • Content and information that other users provide about you when they use HSP Services, such as through our ‘Connect and Collaborate’ features, including information about you, such as when they share a photo of you, attend / organize an event with you, send a message to you, or upload, sync or import your contact information;
  • Any content populated by you into the HSP web or mobile application (e.g. lesson plans, student grades/reports, calendar entries, user files uploaded such as images, documents or files and curriculum information).
  • The app does use third party services that may collect information used to identify you.

Link to privacy policy of third party service providers used by the app

  • Google Play Services
  • Google Analytics for Firebase
  • Firebase Crashlytics o Facebook
  • Intercom
A Better User Experience

The information we learn from users helps us personalize and continually improve your HSP experience. Here are the types of information we gather.

  • Information You Provide Us: We receive and store any information you enter on our Web site or give us in any other way. You can choose not to provide certain information, but then you might not be able to take advantage of many of our features. We use the information that you provide for such purposes as responding to your requests, customizing future services for you, improving our offerings, and communicating with you.
  • Automatic Information: We receive and store certain types of information whenever you interact with us. For example, like many Web sites, we use "cookies," and we obtain certain types of information when your Web browser accesses HSP or advertisements and other content served by or on behalf of HSP on other Web sites. Click here to see examples of the information we receive.
  • Mobile: When you download, or use Apps created by HSP or our subsidiaries, we may receive information about your location and your mobile device, including a unique identifier for your device. We may use this information to provide you with location-based services, such as local events, “Homeschoolers Near Me”, advertising, search results, and other personalized content. Most mobile devices allow you to turn off location services. For more information about how to do this, click here.
  • E-mail Communications: To help us make e-mails more useful and interesting, we often receive a confirmation when you open e-mail from HSP if your computer supports such capabilities. We also compare our user list to lists received from other marketing companies, to avoid sending unnecessary messages to our users. If you do not want to receive e-mail or other mail from us, please adjust your preferences by visiting the Preferences and/or Settings features available within HSP.
  • Information From Other Sources: We might receive information about you from other sources and add it to our account information. Click here to see examples of the information we receive.
  • Much of the information we collect is also used for statistical analysis and technical improvements to the site. Our computer system uses software programs to create summary statistics, which may be used for such purposes as assessing what information is of most and least interest, determining technical design specifications, and identifying system performance or problem areas. In certain circumstances, however, we may take additional steps to identify you based on this information and we may share this information, including your identity, with other government law enforcement agencies and / or with a court of the law.

What About Cookies?

  • Cookies are unique identifiers that we transfer to your device to enable our systems to recognize your device and to provide customized and personalized service experience for you. We also use cookies for storage of tools, resources and data in your user profile between visits.
  • The Help feature on most browsers will tell you how to prevent your browser from accepting new cookies, how to have the browser notify you when you receive a new cookie, or how to disable cookies altogether. Additionally, you can disable or delete similar data used by browser add-ons, such as Flash cookies, by changing the add-on's settings or visiting the Web site of its manufacturer. Because cookies allow you to take advantage of some of HSP’s highlight features, we recommend that you leave them turned on. For instance, if you block or otherwise reject our cookies, you may not be able to store a history of recently used entries, and tools, save your HSP user name, or use any HSP Services that require you to sign in.

Does HSP Share the Information It Receives?

Information about our users is an important part of our business, and we are not in the business of selling it to others. We share user information only as described below and with affiliates HSP controls that either are subject to this Privacy Notice or follow practices at least as protective as those described in this Privacy Notice.

  • Affiliated Businesses We Do Not Control:  We work closely with affiliated businesses. In some cases, such as marketplace educators, bloggers and solution providers, these businesses may operate in their respective spaces at www.HomeschoolPanda.com, on the HSP mobile app or promote offerings to you at www.HomeschoolPanda.com and HSP mobile app. In other cases, we may operate within the same spaces, provide services, or promote product lines jointly with these businesses. HSP will make take all reasonable steps to inform you when a third party is involved in your interactions at HSP, and we may share user information related to those interactions with that third party.
  • Third-Party Service Providers:  We may work with other companies and individuals to perform functions on our behalf. Examples include fulfilling orders, sending postal mail and e-mail, removing repetitive information from user lists, analyzing data, providing marketing assistance, providing search results and links (including paid listings and links), processing credit card payments, and providing customer service. They have access to personal information needed to perform their functions, but may not use it for other purposes. Each third party that we work with are subject to strict Confidentiality, Non-Disclosure and Non-Compete agreements as applicable.
  • Promotional Offers:  Sometimes we may send offers to selected groups of users on behalf of other businesses. When we do this, we do not give that business your name or contact information. If you do not want to receive such offers, you have the option to opt out by simply clicking on the “opt out” or “unsubscribe” links located within such communication or by emailing [email protected] and advising your contact preferences.
  • Business Transfers:  As we continue to develop our business, we might sell or buy software, offerings, subsidiaries, or business units. In such transactions, user information generally is one of the transferred business assets but remains subject to the promises made in any pre-existing Privacy Notice (unless, of course, the user consents otherwise). Also, in the unlikely event that HSP, or substantially all of its assets are acquired, user information will of course be one of the transferred assets.
  • Protection of HSP and Others:  We release account and other personal information when we believe release is appropriate to comply with the law; enforce or apply our Terms of Use and other agreements; or protect the rights, property, or safety of HSP platforms, our users, or others. This includes exchanging information with law enforcement agencies, other companies and organizations for sex offenders registry database check (NSPOW), fraud protection and identity risk reduction. This does not include selling, renting, sharing, or otherwise disclosing personally identifiable information from users for commercial purposes in violation of the commitments set forth in this Privacy Notice.
  • With Your Consent:  Other than as set out above, you will receive notice when information about you might go to third parties, and you will have an opportunity to choose not to share the information.
  • Third Party Analytics:  We have engaged Inspectlet to analyze the activities of visitors to this website, and Inspectlet’s authorized use of cookies and other tracking technologies enable it to have access to Personal Information of visitors to this website. Such access to and use of Personal Information by Inspectlet is governed by Inspectlet’s Privacy Policy https://www.inspectlet.com/legal#privacy.

How Secure Is Information About Me?

  • We work to protect the security of your information during transmission by using Secure Sockets Layer (SSL)software, which encrypts information you input.
  • For HSP services, that may require a financial transaction, we reveal only the last four digits of your credit card numbers when confirming an order. Of course, we transmit the entire credit card number to the appropriate credit card company during order processing.
  • It is important for you to protect against unauthorized access to your password and to your computer. Be sure to sign off when finished using a shared computer.

What About Third-Party Advertisers and Links to Other Websites?

Our site may contain third-party advertising and links to other web sites. For more information about third-party advertising at HSP, including personalized or interest-based ads, please read our Interest-Based Ads policy.

Which Information Can I Access?

HSP gives you access to a broad range of information about your account and your interactions with HSP for the limited purpose of viewing and, in certain cases, updating that information. Some examples are (with notice, this list will change as our services evolve): display or user name, location, show or hide profile, change profile picture, set a status, invite a friend or family member, etc.

What Choices Do I Have?

  • As discussed above, you can always choose not to provide information, even though it might be needed to sign up for a free service or to take advantage of other HSP services (e.g. lesson planner, HSP blog or community forum, curriculum or eLearning software).
  • You can add or update certain information on pages such as those referenced in the ‘Which Information Can I Access?’ section.
  • If you do not want to receive e-mail or other mail from us, please adjust your “Settings” and/or “Preferences” feature within your HSP account or by emailing us at [email protected] . (If you do not want to receive Terms of Use and other legal notices from us, such as this Privacy Notice, those notices will still govern your use of HSP, and it is your responsibility to review them for changes.)
  • The Help feature on most browsers will tell you how to prevent your browser from accepting new cookies, how to have the browser notify you when you receive a new cookie, or how to disable cookies altogether. Additionally, you can disable or delete similar data used by browser add-ons, such as Flash cookies, by changing the add-on's settings or visiting the Web site of its manufacturer. Because cookies allow you to take advantage of some of HSP essential features, we recommend that you leave them turned on. For instance, if you block or otherwise reject our cookies, you may not be able to store a history of recently used entries, features and tools, save your HSP user name, or use any HSP products and services that require you to sign in.

Are Children Allowed to Use HSP?

HSP does not offer tools and solutions for subscription / sign up by children. We offer children's education and learning solution for subscription / sign up by adults. If you are under 18, you may use HSP only with the involvement of a parent, guardian or responsible adult. Parents, teachers & educators, care givers, guardians, instructors or responsible adults may subscribe / sign up for an offering from HSP; learners and students under 18 may use HSP services with supervision and direction from an adult.

EU-US Privacy Shield

HSP highly regards the EU-US Privacy Shield Framework regarding the collection, use, and retention of personal information from European Union member countries. Upon registration with the EU-US Privacy Shield, we aim to certify with the Department of Commerce that we adhere to the Privacy Shield Principles. To learn more about the Privacy Shield Principles, click here.

We also aim to adhere to privacy best practices regarding the collection and use of personal information on our websites and apps. To that effect, we are working to be certified with an independent privacy compliance solution provider, which provides a Privacy Seal on a website or app, asserting that, the company operating that property has met the privacy certification requirements established by independent privacy compliance solution provider and / or applicable regulatory bodies.

If you have any inquiries or complaints about our handling of your personal data under Privacy Shield, or about our privacy practices generally, please contact us at: [email protected], and we will respond to your inquiry promptly.

HSP is working diligently, to register with an independent third-party dispute resolution service to ensure privacy compliance. If we are unable to satisfactorily resolve any complaint relating to the Privacy Shield, or if we fail to acknowledge your complaint in a timely fashion, you will be able to submit your complaint to the third party, which provides an independent third-party dispute resolution service based in the United States. Once HSP has registered, the third party will be committed to respond to complaints and to provide appropriate recourse at no cost to you. If neither HSP nor the third party will resolve your complaint, you may pursue binding arbitration through the Privacy Shield Panel. To learn more about the Privacy Shield Panel, click here.

As explained here we may sometimes provide personal information to third parties to perform services on our behalf. If we transfer personal information received under the Privacy Shield to a third party, the third party's access, use, and disclosure of the personal data must also be in compliance with our Privacy Shield obligations, and we will remain liable under the Privacy Shield for any failure to do so by the third party unless we prove we are not responsible for the event giving rise to the damage.

Terms of Use, Notices, and Revisions

If you choose to visit HSP, your visit and any dispute over privacy is subject to this Notice and our Terms of Use, including limitations on damages, resolution of disputes, and application of the law of the state of Florida. If you have any concern about privacy at HSP, please contact us with a thorough description, and we will try to resolve it. Our business changes constantly, and our Privacy Notice and the Terms or Use will change also. We may e-mail periodic reminders of our notices and terms, but you should check our Web site frequently to see recent changes. Unless stated otherwise, our current Privacy Notice applies to all information that we have about you and your account. We stand behind the promises we make and will never materially change our policies and practices to make them less protective of user information collected in the past without the consent of affected users. However, in the interest of better user interaction, experience and protection we may bring forth minor modifications, change in language, revise punctuations, add elaborations and linguistic clarity without affecting the legal and material rights of our users.

Related Practices and Information

Examples of Information Collected

Information You Provide Us

You provide most such information when you sign up, subscribe, search, post, participate in a contest or questionnaire, or communicate with our support line. For example, you provide information when you search for a service or tool on HSP or one of our third-party solution providers; provide information in your user account (and you might have more than one if you have used more than one e-mail address when signing up with us) or your profile; communicate with us by phone, e-mail, or otherwise; complete a questionnaire or a contest entry form; use our services such as ‘The HSP’ You Tube Channel, eLearning Software, Homeschooling Planner, Apps provided by HSP or other community features; and provide and rate Reviews. As a result of those actions, you might supply us with such information as your name, address, and phone numbers; content of reviews and e-mails to us; personal description and photograph in Your Profile.

Automatic Information and Information from others

We collect information about the services that you use and how you use them, for example when you watch a Homeschool Panda video on YouTube or Facebook, visit a website that uses our advertising services, or view and interact with our ads and content. Examples of the information we collect and analyze include the Internet protocol (IP) address used to connect your computer to the Internet; login; e-mail address; password; computer and connection information such as browser type, version, and time zone setting, browser plug-in types and versions, operating system, and platform; subscription history, which we sometimes aggregate with similar information from other users to create features like Dashboard; the full Uniform Resource Locator (URL) clickstream to, through, and from our web site, including date and time; cookie number; services you viewed or searched for; and the phone number you used to call our support services number. We may also use browser data such as cookies, Flash cookies (also known as Flash Local Shared Objects), or similar data on certain parts of our Web site for fraud prevention and other purposes. During some visits we may use software tools such as JavaScript to measure and collect session information, including page response times, download errors, length of visits to certain pages, page interaction information (such as scrolling, clicks, and mouse-overs), and methods used to browse away from the page. We may also collect technical information to help us identify your device for fraud prevention and diagnostic purposes.

Mobile

Most mobile devices provide users with the ability to disable location services. Most likely, these controls are located in the device's settings menu. For information about specific devices, click here. If you have questions about how to disable your device's location services, we recommend you contact your mobile service carrier or your device manufacturer.

Information You Can Access

Examples of information you can access easily at HSP include up-to-date information regarding recent subscriptions; personally identifiable information (including name, e-mail, password, communications and personalized advertising preferences, and address book); e-mail notification settings and Your Profile (including your reviews and community form / blog participations).

Interest-Based Ads Policy

On both HSP-owned and operated sites and unaffiliated sites, HSP may display interest-based advertising using information you make available to us when you interact with our sites, content, or services. Interest-based ads, also sometimes referred to as personalized or targeted ads, are displayed to you based on information from activities such as subscription on our sites, visiting sites that contain HSP content or ads, and/or interacting with HSP tools. Click here for more information about the types of information that we gather. In providing interest-based ads, we follow the guidelines from ‘Self-Regulatory Principles for Online Behavioral Advertising developed by the Digital Advertising Alliance’ (http://digitaladvertisingalliance.org/principles) (a coalition of marketing, online advertising, and consumer advocacy organizations).

Like other online ad networks, we use cookies, web beacons (also known as action tags or single-pixel gifs), and other technologies (collectively, “cookies”). Cookies enable us to learn about what ads you see, what ads you click, and other actions you take on our sites and other sites. This allows us to provide you with more useful and relevant ads. For example, if we know what ads you are shown we can be careful not to show you the same ones repeatedly. We do not associate your interaction with unaffiliated sites with your identity in providing you with interest-based ads.

We do not provide any personal information to advertisers or to third party sites that display our interest-based ads. However, advertisers and other third-parties (including the ad networks, ad-serving companies, and other service providers they may use) may assume that users who interact with or click on a personalized ad or content are part of the group that the ad or content is directed towards (for example, users in the Pacific Northwest who bought or browsed for homeschooling materials). Also, some third-parties may provide us information about you (such as the sites where you have been shown ads or demographic information) from offline and online sources that we may use to provide you more relevant and useful advertising.

Advertisers or ad companies working on their behalf sometimes use technology to serve the ads that appear on our sites directly to your browser. They automatically receive your IP address when this happens. They may also use cookies to measure the effectiveness of their ads and to personalize ad content. We do not have access to or control over cookies or other features that advertisers and third party sites may use, and the information practices of these advertisers and third party websites are not covered by our Privacy Notice or this Interest-Based Ads policy. Please contact them directly for more information about their privacy practices.

Advertising Preferences

HSP offers you choices about receiving interest-based ads from us. You can choose not to receive interest-based ads from HSP. You will still see ads but they will not be personalized.

You can also generally opt-out of receiving personalized ads from third party advertisers and ad networks who are members of the Network Advertising Initiative (NAI) or who follow the Digital Advertising Alliance’s Self-Regulatory Principles for Online Behavioral Advertising by visiting the opt-out pages on the NAI website and DAA website.

Turn Off Location Information on Specific Devices

You can disable all access to location information by applications and collection of location information by your device location service at any time.

To turn off location services on your device, do one of the following:

  • On Kindle Fire devices, tap Location-based Services  in the Settings menu, and then tap Off.

Note: These steps are not applicable to Kindle Fire 1st Generation.

  • On Android devices, tap the Location  option from the Settings menu. Most Android devices will allow you to turn off location services for your entire phone, such as GPS services and other companies' location services. Generally, by leaving a box unchecked, the location service is turned off.
  • On iPhone and Windows phones, tap Settings, then tap Location Services  and toggle the switch to OFF.

**To understand our practices in more details, please review our Terms of Use and Community Rules & Guidelines which also governs your use of HSP Services.**