What is the primary purpose of FERPA?

The primary purpose of FERPA, or the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, is to protect the privacy of student education records. This federal law gives parents certain rights with respect to their children's education records and establishes the criteria under which these records can be disclosed. One of the key provisions of FERPA is that it grants students the right to access their education records and to request corrections to inaccuracies.

Furthermore, FERPA limits the redisclosure of educational records without consent, ensuring that personally identifiable information is kept private and confidential. This protection is crucial in maintaining the trust between educational institutions and students or their families, as it safeguards sensitive information about a student’s academic journey.

Other options focus on aspects related to educational records, but none of them encapsulate the overarching objective of FERPA as effectively as the protection of privacy does. For instance, while ensuring the accuracy of records is important, it is secondary to the primary goal of privacy protection. Similarly, the facilitation of record transfers and the establishment of assessment guidelines are more administrative and procedural in nature rather than centered on the core issue of privacy and rights associated with student records.