Trust Center

How IEP Casemate protects student data — for district privacy officers, IT, and legal counsel. Last updated: July 31, 2026.

The short version

Student data collected	Minimal & de-identified — initials, not full names. No SSNs, DOBs, or home addresses in the standard caseload record.
FERPA role	We act as a school official with legitimate educational interest, under district direction.
Accounts vs student access	Accounts are for educators/staff. Students use educator-created share links for practice, AI tutor, and similar limited experiences — no student login.
AI provider	Google Vertex AI (Google Cloud) by default; not used to train models; region-pinned. Optional district BYOK.
AI features	Document extraction, present levels/progress drafts, practice generation, and goal-aligned AI tutor sessions launched by the case manager.
Data Processing Agreement	Available on request — including the SDPC National Data Privacy Agreement (NDPA).
Encryption	TLS 1.2+ in transit; encrypted at rest (Google Cloud).
Data selling / ads	Never. No advertising, no model training on your data.

Data minimization

Casemate is built to hold as little student data as possible. Teachers enter initials, grade level, IEP goals, services, and schedules. When IEP or assessment PDFs are uploaded, personally identifiable information is stripped before results are stored — names are reduced to initials, and SSNs, dates of birth, phone numbers, emails, and addresses are removed.

FERPA & state student-data-privacy laws

When a school or district uses Casemate, we operate as a school official with a legitimate educational interest under FERPA (34 CFR § 99.31(a)(1)): we use student data only to provide the contracted service under the agency's direction, we do not re-disclose it, and we do not use it for our own purposes. We sign Data Privacy Agreements, including the SDPC National Data Privacy Agreement (NDPA) and state-specific exhibits (e.g., NY Education Law § 2-d, Illinois SOPPA, California). Contact us for an executed agreement.

AI data governance

Generative AI is used for document extraction, present levels and progress drafts, practice generation, and AI tutor sessions. The default path runs through Google Vertex AI on Google Cloud:

Covered by the Google Cloud Data Processing Addendum — content is not used to train Google's models.
Processed within a configured Google Cloud region.
Authenticated by our service account — no API key is transmitted on the default path.
Prompts are built from de-identified data and pass an additional PII-scrubbing step before being sent.
For AI tutor sessions, prompts may include the selected goal, recent progress, relevant assessment summaries, and prior tutor lesson history for that goal — still without full student names.
Educator-facing AI output is a draft; a qualified educator reviews and finalizes AI-assisted IEP documentation. Tutor sessions are instructional tools under educator direction, with prompt-level topic constraints; they are not a guarantee against all model errors.

A district or organization may optionally use its own AI key (BYOK), in which case those requests use that customer's own provider relationship.

Share links (practice, AI tutor, and related)

Case managers create unique, unguessable links for limited experiences such as interactive practice and AI tutor sessions. Students do not create accounts. Possession of a valid, non-expired link grants access to that experience only. Links may expire automatically; authorized users can close sessions. Public link endpoints are rate-limited. Practice answer keys stay server-side and are omitted from student-facing responses.

Treat active links like session credentials. Schools decide how links are distributed under their own policies.

Access control

Access to educator accounts follows your organization's structure and is enforced server-side: teachers see their own caseload; same-school teachers may share caseloads where enabled; principals see their school; district administrators see their district. There is no access across unrelated schools or districts. Share-link recipients see only the linked experience, not the educator account.

Subprocessors

Google Cloud — Firebase Authentication, Firestore, Cloud Functions, Vertex AI, Document AI, Secret Manager
Netlify — application hosting / CDN
Stripe — payment processing
Resend — transactional invitation email (staff addresses only)

Common questions

Do you sell or share student data?

No. We never sell student data and never share it for advertising or marketing.

Is our data used to train AI models?

No. The default Vertex AI path is covered by the Google Cloud DPA, which prohibits using customer content to train Google's models. We also do not train any of our own models on student data.

Do students create accounts?

No. Educators create share links for practice, AI tutor sessions, and certain other features. Anyone with a valid link can use that limited experience until it expires or is closed.

What does the AI tutor know about a student?

For the goal the educator selected: goal text/objectives, recent progress statements, relevant assessment summaries, prior tutor lesson history for that goal, grade level, and accommodations — after PII scrubbing. It is not an open general-purpose chatbot; sessions are scoped to that instructional target.

Will you sign our DPA?

Yes. We sign the SDPC NDPA and state exhibits, and can review a district's own agreement. Email privacy@iepcasemate.com.

Where is data stored and processed?

In Google Cloud, with AI processing pinned to a configured region. Encrypted in transit and at rest.

What happens to data when we stop using Casemate?

Student data is deleted or returned per your agreement; account data is deleted within 30 days of a valid request.

Contact

For DPAs, security questionnaires, or compliance inquiries: privacy@iepcasemate.com