Last Updated: January 6, 2022
GaDOE Community (“Community”), which is owned and operated by the Georgia Department of Education (“GaDOE”), is a professional collaborative website for the Georgia education community.
The views expressed by Members, as defined below, may not reflect those of GaDOE.
By registering to become a user of Community, you are agreeing to enter into a legally binding contract with GaDOE. If after reviewing the terms of this contract (“User Agreement”) and our Privacy Policy, you do not agree with the terms, you should not register for Community or otherwise use any of the services associated with Community, including participating in groups.
Amendments
We reserve the right, in our sole discretion, to make periodic revisions to the User Agreement. When the User Agreement is updated, we will post an announcement in a conspicuous place on Community. We will also include the date of the last revision at the beginning of the User Agreement.
Your continued use of Community after we publish the revised User Agreement means that you consent to the updated terms as of their effective date.
Membership Eligibility
Professionals, who meet one of the following categories, are eligible to register for a Community account:
· Georgia public pre-kindergarten through grade 12 employees;
· GaDOE employees;
· Regional Educational Service Agency employees;
· Other Georgia state agency employees;
· Georgia higher education faculty members;
· GaDOE advisory panel members;
· GaDOE contractors;
· GaDOE collaborative partners, including State Board of Education and local board of education members;
· Georgia private pre-kindergarten through grade 12 employees; and
· Georgia pre-service teachers in a teacher education program.
Community shall not be used by anyone under the age of 18.
If you are a Georgia pre-service teacher under the age of 18, access to Community must be through and under the supervision of a Georgia educator.
GaDOE is not responsible if an ineligible individual registers for a Community account.
Roles
Upon registering for access to Community, you will be assigned the role of Member. Members can join groups and utilize other Community platform features for engagement.
Moderators are GaDOE employees or other individuals who have been designated to serve as moderators for Community. Moderators gain the ability to edit any forum discussion within the group.
Organizers are GaDOE employees. Organizers may limit who is allowed to join their group(s) and may remove anyone who is not an appropriate member of the group(s).
Individuals may be assigned more than one role.
Rules of Usage
You agree that you will:
1. Comply with all applicable laws, including, without limitation, privacy laws, intellectual property laws, and anti-spam laws;
2. Provide accurate information to Community and keep it updated;
3. Use your legal name on your profile;
4. Participate in Community in a professional and constructive manner and post information and comments that are relevant to the groups you join;
5. Maintain the confidentiality of your password;
6. Be responsible for all activities that occur through your account unless it is closed or you report misuse to
[email protected];
7. Grant to GaDOE a royalty-free, perpetual, worldwide, non-exclusive, irrevocable, sublicensable, and transferable right to use, copy, modify, distribute, publish, and process, information and content that you provide in connection with the operation of Community;
8. Notify Community of any unauthorized use of your password or account within two business days of discovery; and
9. Respect the preferences of other users regarding privacy settings, messaging, and connecting.
You agree that you will not:
1. Impersonate any other person or misrepresent your affiliations and job responsibilities;
2. Violate the intellectual property rights of GaDOE or others, including copyrights, patents, trademarks, trade secrets, or other proprietary rights;
3. Download, copy, or modify any information or content in Community except resources that are intended to be shared;
4. Post confidential student information that is protected by the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (“FERPA”) or the Georgia Student Data Privacy, Accessibility, and Transparency Act of 2016;
5. Disclose information that you do not have the consent to disclose, such as confidential information of others;
6. Post anything that contains software viruses, worms, or any other harmful computer code;
7. Use Community to solicit; spam; post information related to promotional offers, research projects, or surveys; or advertise products or services;
8. Post content that may be vulgar, discriminatory, obscene, profane, threatening, abusive, or unlawful;
9. Forge headers or manipulate identifiers to disguise the origin of any communication transmitted through Community;
10. Gather, copy, or extract email addresses for your own purpose or any third-party purpose;
11. Use information obtained from Community for commercial purposes;
12. Use Community for any data mining, information gathering, data compilation, or related purpose;
13. Use automated scripts or any information gathering process to collect any information from the Community;
14. Use Community in any way that could damage, impair, or interfere with its operation;
15. Use information, content, or data to provide any service that is competitive with Community;
16. Attempt to or actually override any security feature or circumvent any access controls of use limits included in or underlying Community; or
17. Use Community in any unlawful manner.
GaDOE is not obligated to review content on Community but has the full right to do so. If any content is reported, then we will review it to determine if it violates the User Agreement and Privacy Policy. We review reported content during regular business hours (Monday through Friday, 8 am to 5 pm).
GaDOE has the right to remove your access to any group if you violate the User Agreement or Privacy Policy.
If your disk space usage exceeds 50 MB or significantly exceeds the average usage of other GaDOE group members, GaDOE reserves the right to take action, as appropriate, to resolve excessive disk space usage.
Professional Learning
Community may host or advertise GaDOE-sponsored courses, webinars, or events that provide free professional learning and generate digital credentials that may be used for evidence of professional development. It is your responsibility to fully participate in and fulfill the expectation of the course or webinar to earn the digital credential, if available.
Community has the right to provide information to a GaDOE supervisor who requests additional information about a Community digital credential earned by one of his or her staff members.
The digital credentials that Community issues are digital badges. Community utilizes Badgr as the service for creating, issuing, organizing, and sharing digital badges. Earners of Badgr-issued digital badges are bound by Badgr's Terms of Service.
Core Engine and Hosting
GaDOE has relationships with subcontractors and service providers who assist us in providing Community service including the core engine, hosting servers, system maintenance, and enhancement. These contractors act on our behalf and are contractually required to maintain the confidentiality of the information we provide them. GaDOE does not own the core platform that powers Community. The core platform is owned and operated by an authorized subcontractor. In the event a problem arises with the core platform or our subcontractor ceases business operations, GaDOE shall have no liability in connection with Community service interruptions or discontinuance of service.
Indemnification
You agree to indemnify and otherwise hold harmless the State of Georgia, GaDOE, and all of their former, current, and future directors, officers, employees, agents, and representatives from any and all claims, disputes, demands, proceedings, causes of action, judgments, damages, liabilities, losses, costs or expense (including, but not limited to reasonable attorneys’ fees) of any kind and nature, known and unknown, suspected and unsuspected, disclosed and undisclosed, that have accrued or may hereafter accrue, whether based in contract, statute, regulation, ordinance, tort (including, but not limited to, fraud, misrepresentation, fraudulent inducement, negligence, or any other intentional tort), or any other legal or equitable theory which may arise out of or are in any way connected with your access, visitation or use of Community, unauthorized access to or alteration of your communications with or through Community, or any other matter relating to Community.
Any interaction and communication that may arise between users from their use of Community are the sole responsibility of the users involved.
Disclaimer of Warranties
YOU UNDERSTAND AND AGREE THAT COMMUNITY IS PROVIDED ON AN “AS IS” AND “AS AVAILABLE” BASIS AND THAT GaDOE DOES NOT ASSUME ANY RESPONSIBILITY FOR PROMPT OR PROPER DELIVERY, OR RETENTION OF ANY USER INFORMATION OR COMMUNICATIONS BETWEEN USERS.
GaDOE DOES NOT ENDORSE NOR DOES IT ASSUME ANY RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE ACCURACY OF ANY COMMUNICATIONS BETWEEN USERS. GaDOE EXPRESSLY DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, WHETHER EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, ACCURACY OF DATA, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, AND NON-INFRINGEMENT.
GaDOE MAKES NO WARRANTY THAT COMMUNITY WILL BE UNINTERRUPTED, TIMELY, SECURE, OR ERROR-FREE; THAT THE RESULTS THAT MAY BE OBTAINED FROM USING COMMUNITY WILL BE ACCURATE OR RELIABLE; THAT THE QUALITY OF ANY PRODUCTS OR SERVICES REFERENCED, INFORMATION, OR OTHER MATERIAL OBTAINED BY YOU THROUGH YOUR PARTICIPATION IN COMMUNITY WILL MEET YOUR EXPECTATIONS; THAT ANY ERRORS IN PROGRAMMING WILL BE CORRECTED.
NO ADVICE OR INFORMATION, WHETHER ORAL OR WRITTEN, OBTAINED BY YOU FROM GaDOE SHALL CREATE ANY WARRANTY NOT EXPRESSLY STATED IN THE USER AGREEMENT.
ANY MATERIAL DOWNLOADED OR OTHERWISE OBTAINED THROUGH COMMUNITY IS DONE AT YOUR OWN RISK, AND YOU ARE SOLELY RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY DAMAGE OR LOSS OF DATA THAT RESULTS FROM THE DOWNLOAD OF SUCH MATERIAL.
GaDOE DOES NOT HAVE ANY OBLIGATION TO VERIFY THE IDENTITY OF THE USERS OF COMMUNITY.
SOME JURISDICTIONS DO NOT ALLOW THE EXCLUSION OF CERTAIN WARRANTIES OR THE LIMITATION OR EXCLUSION OF LIABILITY FOR INCIDENTAL OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES. ACCORDINGLY, SOME OF THE ABOVE LIMITATIONS MAY NOT APPLY TO YOU.
Limitation of Liability
You expressly understand and agree that GaDOE shall not be liable for any direct, indirect, incidental, special, consequential, or exemplary damages, including, but not limited to, damages for loss of profits, goodwill, use, data, or other intangible losses (even if the GaDOE has been advised of the possibility of such damages).
GaDOE reserves the right at any time and from time to time to modify or discontinue, temporarily or permanently, Community and its services (or any part thereof). GaDOE shall not be liable to any user or other third party for any such modification, suspension, or discontinuance except as expressly provided herein.
Termination
GaDOE has the right to terminate your account and access to Community without prior notice if there is any reason to suspect you are not in compliance with the User Agreement or our Privacy Policy.
GaDOE may also terminate your account for one or more of the following reasons:
· If your account has been inactive for more than 18 months,
· If your email address has been determined to be invalid,
· If you request that Community deletes your account,
· If you are ineligible to join Community; or
· In response to a request by law enforcement or other government agencies.
Termination of your account does not mean that the content created by you will be automatically deleted. Therefore, GaDOE does not guarantee that the deletion of your account will remove content posted by you to Community. GaDOE shall not be liable either to you or any third-party for the termination of your account or access to Community, or any deletion of content created by you.
Governing Law and Venue
The User Agreement will be governed by and construed in accordance with the laws of the State of Georgia without regard to conflict of law principles.
Fulton County, Georgia shall be the proper place of venue for any suit on or in respect to this Agreement.
General Terms
You may not assign or transfer this User Agreement (or your membership or use of Community) to anyone without GaDOE’s consent. There are no third-party beneficiaries to this User Agreement.
If you are using GaDOE Community from outside the United States, you consent to the transfer of your information to the United States for processing and maintaining in accordance with this User Agreement and our Privacy Policy. You consent to the application of United States law in all matters concerning Community.
If GaDOE does not act to enforce a breach of this User Agreement, that does not mean that GaDOE has waived its right to enforce this User Agreement.
If a court with authority over this User Agreement finds any part of it unenforceable, you and GaDOE agree that the court should modify the terms to make that part enforceable while still achieving its intent. If the court cannot do that, you and GaDOE agree to ask the court to remove that unenforceable part and still enforce the rest of this User Agreement.
Without limitation of the terms and conditions set forth in our Privacy Policy, you understand and agree that Community may disclose information if required to do so by law, such as the Georgia Open Records Act, or in the good faith belief that such disclosure is reasonably necessary to comply with legal process, enforce this
User Agreement, or protect the rights, property, or safety of Community, its users, and the public.
The User Agreement constitutes the entire agreement between the you and the Georgia Department of Education regarding your use of Community. Any prior agreements between you and GaDOE as it relates to Community are superseded.
GaDOE Community Communications
By registering for Community, you give your consent for GaDOE to contact you via email to provide information regarding your membership and Community. You agree to receive email notifications that are specific to your account and necessary for the normal functioning of Community. You agree to have your name, email address, or both listed in the header of notifications that are initiated through Community. You can manage the delivery of notifications in your Community settings.
Contact
You may contact GaDOE Community by email at
[email protected].
Our mailing address is: GaDOE Community Office of Technology Services Georgia Department of Education 1562 Twin Towers East 205 Jesse Hill Jr. Dr, SE Atlanta, GA 30334.
