All of the schools in our district do this. There has never been an issue with it.
I have put together ours for the past 3 years. It is a labor of love, as it can take anywhere from 250 to 300 hours to complile, complete, print and distribute.
I also do membership and tie the directory directly to it. When parents fill out the membership forms, I ask them specifically if they wish their childrens information to be printed. It is also greatly helpful for committee chairpeople for contacting their members.
All PTO members automatically get a copy of the directory as to admin and teachers. If you chose not to become a PTO member, you don't get a directory.
Principals and all school administrators have a tough job. They have to walk a fine line between protecting the privacy of families and following the rules of public information (for a public school).
Like yours, our Principal is pretty careful about just handing information out. But the fact is - if you call your school district and ask for "directory information", they probabably have to give it to you - legally. This will depend somewhat on state laws and what your district has defined as directory information. And they may charge an administrative fee. Last year I called our district, just see how they responded. It would have taken a week and $35, but they would have given me the information (electronically) for all students without a do-not-disclose request on file.
I'm not suggesting you circumvent your principal. But often they don't even understand the true rules/laws. It might be that if you work with him and prove you have a good process for opt outs, he would be fine with it - especially if it's true in your state that practically anyone could get the info if they really wanted it.
Our principal doesn't allow our PTO to have any info on the students. We don't get class list, etc. All we have is a student per class count. We have info if parents sign up for PTO membership. But some parents are saying they would like to have a
student directory or at least a grade directory.
If you do a key word search on "directory", you'll find a wealth of information in old posts.
Many PTOs - especially elementary schools - publish a student directory. Some have an opt in process where people have to sign up to be included. Others have an opt out where you have an opportunity to excluded.
While PTOs are usually fairly careful not to share/sell directories to non-families, the basic info (student name, address, phone number, grade) is typically public information that's available to anyone. Under FERPA (Family Educational Rights to Privacy) educational records are deemed confidential and schools have the obligation to disclose what "directory information" is and allow families the right to file a written do-not-disclose request.
Note without some of this information being public by default, you couldn't have school directories, yearbooks, newsletters, athletic rosters, and press coverage of student accomplishments without a LOT of signed disclosure for every little item.
With my schools - my elementary directory is published by the PTO as an opt out version. We take great care to send notices home and allow anyone the opportunity to delete any/all of their info. We don't have a privacy policy per se, but we only give the directory to school families and staff.
The middle school one is published by one of the student groups and just "appeared" one day. I never saw any paperwork allowing us to be included or excluded.
Does your school have a student directory for phone listings, etc.? If so,for all grades? And do you have a privacy policy along with it? Sorry if this post doesn't belong here.
