Privacy Policy

The short version

• This website sets no cookies and runs no analytics, advertising, or tracking scripts.
• We collect personal information only when you send it to us — through a program application form or by email.
• We never sell or rent personal information, and we do not share it for advertising.
• Applications for our programs are submitted by a parent or guardian, and a parent or guardian can ask us to delete them at any time.
• Enrolled families and coaches also use a separate sign-in-only Dashboard, which does keep accounts and records. It is described in its own section below.

Who we are

This site is operated by Tawasaw Robotics.

This policy covers two things: this public website,robotics.tawasaw.org, together with the program applications linked from it; and the Tawasaw Robotics Dashboard atrobotics.tawasaw.com, which enrolled families and coaches sign in to. They are separate systems and they handle information differently, so each is described separately below.

It does not cover other Tawasaw Institute websites, or the third-party sites and services described below, each of which has its own privacy policy.

Information we collect

Information you give us

Our application pages embed a Google Form. When a parent or guardian completes one, the form collects the information requested on it — typically the student's name, age or grade, school, program of interest, and a parent or guardian's name, email address, and phone number, along with anything else you choose to write in.

If you email us, we receive your email address and whatever you include in your message.

Information collected automatically

This public website is static. It has no accounts, no logins, and no database of visitors. We do not set cookies here, and we do not use Google Analytics or any other analytics or advertising service.

The Dashboard at robotics.tawasaw.com is different — it has accounts and it does keep records. SeeThe Tawasaw Robotics Dashboard.

Two services do see technical information simply because the site loads through them:

• GitHub Pages hosts this site and records standard server request information, such as IP addresses, for security and operations. We do not have access to those logs.
• Google Fonts serves the typefaces used here. Loading a page requests those font files from Google's servers, which means Google receives your IP address and browser information as part of that request.

The Tawasaw Robotics Dashboard

Once a student has a place on a team, we run the season through our own application at robotics.tawasaw.com. Unlike this public website, it has accounts and it keeps records.

Who has an account

Only people we have already added: enrolled students, their parents and guardians, and the coaches, mentors and administrators who run the program. There is no public sign-up. If someone we have not added tries to sign in, the Dashboard turns them away rather than creating an account. This is a program for children, and an open sign-up would put strangers inside the family roster.

How signing in works

There are no passwords, so there is no password for us to store or for anyone to steal. You sign in one of two ways:

• With Google. We ask Google only for your name, email address, and profile picture. We cannot read or send your mail, and we cannot see your contacts, calendar, files, or anything else in your Google account. Google confirms you control the address; we never see your Google password.
• With a one-time link emailed to the address we already hold for you. The link expires after five minutes, is stored only as a cryptographic hash, and works once.

Signing in sets a session cookie so you stay signed in for up to thirty days. It exists only to keep you signed in — it does not track you, and there are no advertising or analytics cookies anywhere in the Dashboard.

What the Dashboard stores

• People and households — name, email address, phone number, and which family a person belongs to.
• Team membership — which team someone is on, in what role, and when they joined or left.
• Applications — a student's application for a season and the decision on it, including any note an administrator recorded.
• Signed agreements — which agreement a guardian signed, for which student, and when.
• Attendance — arrival and departure times at team meetings, and whether an absence was excused.
• An audit log — a record of administrative actions, so a change to a child's record can always be traced to the adult who made it.

We do not currently use camera check-in, so no QR badge is issued and no photograph is taken at check-in.

Where it runs

• Cloudflare hosts the Dashboard and stores its database. Cloudflare processes this information on our behalf.
• Resend delivers the Dashboard's email — sign-in links and notices about an application.
• Zeffy is the platform donations are made through. The Dashboard mirrors what Zeffy reports about a donation so we can keep our own books. It no longer links a donation to a person or a household record, and our program charges no registration fee.

Deleting a Dashboard record

A parent or guardian can ask us to erase their family's records, either by email or from within the Dashboard, and an administrator reviews the request.

Completing an erasure removes contact details, the sign-in account and any pending sign-in link, badge tokens, the original imported spreadsheet row, and the free-text reason on any excused absence.

Some things are kept, and we would rather say so plainly than imply otherwise. A signed agreement, an attendance record, a donation record and the audit log remain, because a minor's signed agreement may need to outlive their reaching adulthood, and donation records are kept for seven years for accounting. A person's name is kept so those remaining records stay attributable. The record is archived rather than deleted outright, and it is closed to everyone, including the guardian who could previously see it.

How we use information

• To review applications and place students into a team.
• To contact families about meetings, schedule changes, competitions, travel, permission forms, and other program logistics.
• To answer questions you send us.
• To keep basic records of team rosters and season participation.

We do not use your information to build advertising profiles, and we do not use it for any purpose unrelated to running the program.

Third-party services we rely on

• Google Workspace — Google Forms collects applications, and the responses are stored in our Google account along with our program email.
• Google Sign-In — one of the two ways to sign in to the Dashboard. We receive only your name, email address, and profile picture.
• Cloudflare — hosting and the database behind the Tawasaw Robotics Dashboard.
• Resend — delivers the Dashboard's sign-in links and notices.
• Zeffy — the donation platform, and the source of what the Dashboard shows about a donation.
• GitHub Pages — website hosting.
• Google Fonts — web typefaces.
• Instagram and YouTube — our social accounts. Following those links takes you to Meta and Google properties, which track visitors under their own policies.
• FIRST — students who compete must be registered with FIRST by a parent or guardian through the FIRST registration system. That registration, including the consent and release forms it requires, is handled directly by FIRST under its own privacy policy.

Who we share information with

We do not sell, rent, or trade personal information.

We share it only in these situations:

• With coaches, mentors, and staff who need it to run the program.
• With the service providers listed above, which process information on our behalf.
• With FIRST and tournament organizers when a team registers for or competes at an event, as those events require.
• When the law requires it, or when it is necessary to protect the safety of a participant.

Children's privacy

Our programs serve students from roughly ages 9 through 18, so we expect to handle information about children. We ask that applications and other correspondence about a student come from a parent or guardian, not from the student directly.

We collect the minimum needed to run the program safely, we do not knowingly collect personal information from a child under 13 without a parent or guardian, and we do not use children's information for advertising or share it for marketing purposes.

If you believe a child has sent us personal information without a parent's or guardian's involvement, email us and we will delete it.

Photos and video

We sometimes photograph or record team activities and competitions and share highlights on our Instagram and YouTube accounts or on this website. Media consent is handled through the FIRST registration and consent forms and through our own permission forms. If you would prefer that your child not appear in photos or video we publish, tell us and we will honor that — and if something is already posted, contact us and we will take it down.

How long we keep information

We keep application responses and roster information for as long as a student participates, plus a reasonable period afterward for season records and to make it easy for returning families to sign up again. Email correspondence is kept in our program mailbox. You can ask us to delete a record sooner.

Dashboard records follow the same principle, with two exceptions we keep deliberately: a signed agreement, because a minor's consent may need to outlive their reaching adulthood, and a donation record, kept seven years for accounting. What an erasure removes and what it keeps is set out underDeleting a Dashboard record.

Security

Applications and email live in access-controlled Google accounts limited to the adults who run the program, and this site is served over HTTPS. No method of storage or transmission is perfectly secure, so we cannot guarantee absolute security, but we limit both what we collect and who can see it.

The Dashboard is served over HTTPS and stores no passwords, so there is no password to be lost in a breach. What each person can see is decided for every request rather than by what the screen happens to show: a coach reaches their own team, a guardian reaches their own family, and a student reaches only their own attendance. Guardian contact details follow responsibility for a team, not the running of its attendance, so an adult who only takes the register does not see them.

Your choices and requests

Email us at robotics-outreach@tawasaw.org to:

• Ask what information we hold about you or your child.
• Correct information that is wrong or out of date.
• Ask us to delete an application or other records.
• Ask us to erase your family's Dashboard records — you can also raise this from inside the Dashboard itself.
• Ask us to stop contacting you.
• Ask us to remove a photo or video.

California residents, including parents acting for their children, have rights under the California Consumer Privacy Act to know, delete, and correct personal information, and not to be discriminated against for exercising them. We do not sell or share personal information as those terms are defined by the CCPA. Send any request to the address above and we will respond.

Changes to this policy

If we change how we handle information, we will update this page and the "last updated" date at the top. Material changes affecting current families will also go out by email.

Contact us

Questions about this policy or about your family's information:robotics-outreach@tawasaw.org.

Last updated September 9, 2026.