Empower IL Privacy Policy

Empower Illinois takes your privacy seriously. Please carefully read this Privacy Policy and familiarize yourself with our privacy practices regarding your personal information and how we will use it. This Privacy Policy applies to the Empower Illinois website and all related websites, mobile applications, and other services and solutions (“Sites and Services”) owned and operated by Empower Illinois.

To make this document more readable, “we”, “us”, and “our” refer to Empower Illinois. “You” and “your” refers to anybody using our Sites and Services.

Empower Illinois provides scholarships to low-income and working-class students. We work with donors to help them donate to Illinois’s tax credit scholarship program, schools to help them secure scholarships for their students from low-income and working class families, and parents and guardians to help them apply for available scholarships for their children. We also advocate and lobby for legislation that allows us to provide greater educational opportunities to low-income and working class families.

This policy describes how Empower Illinois collects and uses your personal information in order to provide these services.  By using our Sites and Services, you consent to us collecting and storing your data as described in this Privacy Policy and our Terms & Conditions.  If you do not agree to these terms, please do not use our Sites and Services.  Our Terms & Conditions also cover your use of our Sites and Services; so please make sure you read our Terms & Conditions carefully.

We may revise this Privacy Policy from time to time.  We will post any changes on this page and update the date at the top; so be sure to check back periodically to stay aware of any modifications.  Your continued use of our Sites and Services after changes have been posted will constitute your acceptance of this Privacy Policy and any changes.

What We Collect

We collect data from the following types of users interacting with our Sites and Services:

“Visitors” – users accessing the Empower Illinois Site(s);

“Donors” – users accessing our website to donate to Illinois’s tax credit scholarship program;

“Schools” – users accessing our website on behalf of a school to secure financial scholarships for the school’s students; and

“Parents” – users accessing our website to apply for available scholarships on behalf of their children.

Empower Illinois collects the following information from Visitors, Donors, Schools, and Parents (collectively, “Users”):

For Visitors to our website, we collect any information you directly provide to us, which may include your name and basic contact information,(including email, address, and phone number (“Basic Contact Information”).

For Donors, we collect information including Basic Contact Information, the amount donated, and any Donor conditions on the donation. We also collect the information that you submit on your Contribution Authorization Certificate from the Illinois Department of Revenue. Through our service provider, we may also collect your payment information, including bank account information. By law, we are required to keep Basic Contact Information and contribution histories of Donors on file.

For Schools, we collect information relevant to the school’s scholarship applicants, recognition status with the Illinois State Board of Education, tuition and fees, address and contact information for the school and its key staff, and information required to provide scholarship payments to the schools.

For Parents and Guardians, we collect information that you provide to us, including Basic Contact information, Social Security number, ethnicity and/or race and other demographic information, information included on your tax return, and other financial information including your annual income. We also collect information related to your student, including the student’s name, Social Security number, and ethnicity and/or race and other demographic information.

We may also automatically collect information about how you use our Sites and Services to optimize your experience on our Sites. This includes commonly logged user-to-server information such as device internet protocol (IP) address, device type, browser and operating system type, and information about the pages you visit on our Sites.

We, or third parties contracted by us, may use cookies, logging, tracking or similar technologies to help deliver Empower Illinois’s services. The information obtained through these tracking technologies may be linked to other Visitor, Donor, School, or Parent information. If you disable technologies such as cookies through your web browser, it may impair your ability to access and use our Sites and Services.

We do not respond to web browser “do not track” signals.

We also may allow third parties, like ad networks and servers, to serve customized ads to you on our Sites and Services or on third-party websites. These third parties may use their own cookies and other tracking technologies on the browser that you use to access our Sites and Services. We do not have access to information collected by these third parties, nor does this privacy policy govern the use of third party cookies or similar technology. If you do not wish to receive these tailored advertisements, you can visit the Network Advertising Initiative’s website, the Digital Advertising Alliance’s website and Google’s Ads Preference Manager to learn more information about tailored browser advertising and how you can control cookies or opt out from such services.

How We Use Your Data

We collect and use your personal information to operate our Sites and Services, to administer scholarship programs, and to deliver the services you have requested. As described above, the purpose for collecting personal information differs for Donors, Schools, and Parents. Empower Illinois collects information from Donors to facilitate their efforts to donate to Illinois’s tax credit scholarship program, collect their donations, and allocate their donations to specified schools or regions. We collect information from Schools to help them participate in scholarship programs and advocate for the Invest in Kids Act or successor legislation. We collect information from Parents to help them complete scholarship applications on behalf of their student children and to help them contact their elected officials. We share information between Donors, Schools, School Networks, Parents, and others as required by law, although we respect Donors who wish to remain anonymous and not have their information shared with others.

We may sell your Basic Contact Information to other organizations that want to provide you with additional information about how you can be involved to support making scholarships possible. If you do not wish your Basic Contact Information to be provided to other organizations, you may opt out by emailing Empower Illinois at info@empowerillinois.org.

As noted below, Empower Illinois partners with and hires other companies to provide services on its behalf. If you provide personal information directly to these other companies on their websites, please be aware that your information is governed by their respective privacy policies. We encourage you to review their privacy policies carefully.

Empower Illinois reserves the right to aggregate and anonymize your personal information for marketing, research, or any other lawful purpose.

For all Visitors to our Site(s), we also use the data we collect to operate the Site(s), provide technical troubleshooting or support, solicit feedback, and provide notice and alerts of product upgrades, planned maintenance, or downtime. We may use personal information you previously provided while visiting our website when you return on subsequent visits, for your convenience.

We may also disclose your information to protect our rights or property or the safety of our employees or others; to comply with any court order, legal process, or respond to any governmental or regulatory request; to comply with the provisions of the Illinois Invest in Kids Act or successor legislation; and to transfer information in the event of a merger, transfer of assets or other organizational restructuring.

Empower Illinois reserves the right to retain personal information indefinitely. Upon request, Empower Illinois will provide you with information about whether we hold or process any of your personal information and the type of information we hold.

We normally would not hold records covered by the Illinois School Student Records Act or the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (“FERPA”). If any of the records we hold are determined to be covered by the Illinois School Student Records Act or FERPA, Parents would have rights (1) To inspect and copy the records; (2) To challenge the contents of the records; (3) To limit any consent to designated records or designated portions of information within the records’ and (4) any other rights provided under applicable law.

In certain circumstances, we may be required by law to retain your personal information.

Third Party Services

Empower Illinois partners with and hires other companies to provide services on its behalf. In some circumstances, we may directly share User personal information with these service providers. We require our service providers to maintain the confidentiality of personal information that we share with them and prohibit them from using the information for any purpose other than the purpose for which it was collected.

Our Sites and Services may contain links to other websites provided by third parties, such as social media plug-ins. Please be aware that we do not control these third party websites or any of the content contained on those websites. Once you click on links that take you to other websites, we cannot be responsible for the privacy practices of such other websites. We encourage you to exercise caution and to read the privacy policy for any website that you visit. The inclusion of hyperlinks to third party websites on our Sites and Services in no way constitutes an endorsement by us of such websites’ content, security practices, or policies.

Opt-Out of Promotional Emails

We may contact Visitors to our Site(s) via email if you have submitted your personal information during your visit to our Site(s). If you wish to opt-out of receiving future promotional communications, you may do so by following the unsubscribe instructions included in these emails, or by contacting us at info@empowerillinois.org.

User Testimonials and Feedback

We often receive testimonials and comments from users who have had positive experiences with our scholarship programs. We occasionally publish such content along with the user’s first name and last initial. We may seek your consent to publish your last name and/or home city alongside your testimonial or feedback.

Please be aware that if you make any comments on a blog or forum associated with another website, any personal data you submit there can be read, collected, or used by the operator of that website and other users of that forum. We are not responsible for the personally identifiable information you choose to post on blogs and forums not operated by Empower Illinois.

Security

We are committed to maintaining your confidence and trust, and take steps to help protect the personal information you provide to us. However, no transmission or electronic storage of information is guaranteed to be secure. We therefore urge you to always use caution when transmitting information over the internet.

Your California Privacy Rights

California’s “Shine The Light” law permits California residents to annually request and obtain information free of charge about what personal information is disclosed to third parties for direct marketing purposes in the preceding calendar year.

COPPA

Our website is not specifically directed to children under 13. If you inform us that we have collected or received information from a child under 13, we will delete such information immediately from our databases. We shall not knowingly use or disclose any personal information that we know to have been erroneously collected from children under 13.

Consent to Transfer

Our Site operates in the United States. If you are located outside of the United States, please be aware that any information you provide to us will be transferred to the United States, even though the United States has privacy laws that the European Union considers not to be adequate. By using our Site, participating in any of our services and/or providing us with your information, you consent to this transfer.

Feedback or Questions

If you have questions or comments, please reach out to us at info@empowerillinois.org and we will get back to you as soon as we can.