Privacy Policy

1. Overview

The College for World Connections ("CWC," "we," "us," or "our"), operated by the World Connections Foundation, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization, is committed to protecting your privacy. This Privacy Policy explains how we collect, use, disclose, and safeguard your information when you visit our website and use our educational platform and services.

By accessing or using our platform, you acknowledge that you have read, understood, and agree to be bound by this Privacy Policy. If you do not agree with the terms of this policy, please do not access the site.

2. Information We Collect

Information You Provide Directly

We collect information you voluntarily provide when you:

• Create an account — name, email address, password
• Complete your student profile — biography, time zone, country, LinkedIn URL
• Enroll in a course — enrollment and payment details
• Submit assignments, quizzes, or discussion posts
• Contact us through our contact form
• Apply to become an educator on our platform
• Subscribe to announcements or communications

Information Collected Automatically

When you access our platform, we may automatically collect certain technical information including:

• IP address and approximate geographic location
• Browser type, version, and operating system
• Pages visited, time spent, and navigation paths
• Device identifiers and screen resolution
• Referring URLs and search terms

Payment Information

All payment processing is handled securely by Stripe, our third-party payment processor. We do not store your full credit card number, CVV, or complete payment card details on our servers. We retain only non-sensitive payment metadata such as the last four digits of your card, card brand, and transaction reference identifiers provided by Stripe.

3. How We Use Your Information

We use the information we collect for the following purposes:

• Account management — creating and maintaining your account, authenticating your identity, and providing access to enrolled courses
• Educational delivery — tracking lesson progress, quiz scores, assignment submissions, and issuing certificates upon completion
• Payment processing — processing enrollment fees and issuing receipts through Stripe
• Communications — sending transactional emails such as account confirmation, password resets, enrollment confirmations, and course announcements
• Platform improvement — analyzing usage patterns to improve course content, platform performance, and user experience
• Legal compliance — meeting our legal obligations as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization
• Support — responding to your questions, comments, and support requests

We will never use your personal information for purposes incompatible with those described above without first obtaining your consent.

4. Information Sharing

We do not sell, trade, rent, or otherwise transfer your personal information to outside parties except as described below:

• Service providers — We may share information with trusted third-party vendors who assist us in operating our platform (e.g., Stripe for payments, our hosting provider, email delivery services). These vendors are contractually obligated to keep your information confidential and use it only for the services they provide to us.
• Educators — If you are enrolled in a course, the educator of that course may have access to your name, progress, and submissions relevant to their course.
• Legal requirements — We may disclose your information if required to do so by law or in response to valid requests by public authorities (e.g., a court or government agency).
• Business transfers — In the event of a merger, acquisition, or transfer of all or a portion of our assets, your information may be transferred as part of that transaction.
• With your consent — We may share your information for any other purpose with your explicit consent.

5. Payment & Security

We implement industry-standard security measures to protect your personal information from unauthorized access, use, or disclosure. Your data is transmitted using TLS (Transport Layer Security) encryption.

All payment transactions are processed by Stripe, a PCI DSS Level 1 compliant payment processor. Stripe's privacy policy governs the collection and use of your payment information. We strongly encourage you to review Stripe's Privacy Policy.

While we strive to use commercially acceptable means to protect your information, no method of transmission over the Internet or method of electronic storage is 100% secure. We cannot guarantee absolute security.

6. Cookies & Tracking

We use cookies and similar tracking technologies to enhance your experience on our platform. Cookies are small data files stored on your device.

We use the following types of cookies:

• Essential cookies — Required for the platform to function, including authentication session cookies. These cannot be disabled.
• Functional cookies — Remember your preferences such as time zone and display settings.
• Analytics cookies — Help us understand how visitors interact with our platform so we can improve it.

You can instruct your browser to refuse all cookies or to indicate when a cookie is being sent. However, if you do not accept essential cookies, you will not be able to log into your account or access enrolled courses.

7. Data Retention

We retain your personal information for as long as your account is active or as needed to provide you services. Specifically:

• Account data — Retained for the life of your account plus 3 years after account closure
• Course and certificate records — Retained indefinitely to support certificate verification
• Payment records — Retained for 7 years as required by financial regulations
• Contact form submissions — Retained for 2 years
• Audit logs — Retained for 2 years

You may request deletion of your account and associated personal data at any time, subject to our legal retention obligations above.

8. Your Rights

Depending on your jurisdiction, you may have the following rights regarding your personal information:

• Access — Request a copy of the personal information we hold about you
• Correction — Request correction of inaccurate or incomplete information
• Deletion — Request deletion of your personal information, subject to legal retention requirements
• Portability — Request transfer of your data in a machine-readable format
• Objection — Object to certain processing of your personal information
• Withdraw consent — Where processing is based on consent, withdraw that consent at any time

To exercise any of these rights, please contact us at cwc.info@wcfaz.org. We will respond to your request within 30 days.

9. Children's Privacy

Our platform is not directed to children under the age of 13. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children under 13. If you are a parent or guardian and believe your child has provided us with personal information, please contact us immediately at cwc.info@wcfaz.org and we will take steps to delete such information.

10. Third-Party Links

Our platform may contain links to third-party websites. We have no control over and assume no responsibility for the content, privacy policies, or practices of any third-party sites or services. We encourage you to review the privacy policy of every site you visit.

11. Changes to This Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. We will notify you of any material changes by posting the new policy on this page and updating the "Last updated" date at the top. We encourage you to review this policy periodically.

Your continued use of the platform after any changes constitutes your acceptance of the updated Privacy Policy.

12. Contact Us

If you have questions, concerns, or requests regarding this Privacy Policy or our data practices, please contact us: