Important Artificial Intelligence (AI) FERPA/COPPA/Privacy Considerations

Facts you should be aware of

• AI products can be incredible tools when individuals understand the privacy risks and considerations

• Most (all?) Free AI tools (exceptions: Google Gemini for Education and other FERPA compliant AI tools) take any information and questions you feed into it and add that data to their public AI database to allow it to improve its future responses

  • It's possible that the data you feed in could come back out to another individual in part or in whole (although rare)

  • Your data goes into a database (public in many cases) owned by the AI company

  • Is your data being sold?

  • What happens with the data if the company goes out of business or gets hacked?

  • Use AI products safely (see bullets below)

Utilizing Artificial Intelligence (AI) Products in a safe FERPA/COPPA Compliant Manner

• Always assess if the product is FERPA/COPPA Compliant especially if educators plan on utilizing an AI tool with students. Most also limit their use to 18 and over (some 13 and over) in their terms of service due to privacy and regulatory facts

• Always sanitize data (remove any Personally Identifiable Information/PII and FERPA information, banking/financial information etc.) before submission to any AI products

• Never submit student pictures to AI products that have not been approved by parents

• Never link your district Google (or any accounts) to AI products without fully understanding what you are sharing from your account (for instance the free/personal/NON Educational version of Google Gemini can suck in your emails and google docs into its public learning model and also has human reviewers that can review your submitted questions and data for enhancing their AI model. Other products can have similar privacy considerations)

• FERPA: https://studentprivacy.ed.gov/ferpa

• COPPA (limits data collection for kids under 13 and other restrictions): Children's Online Privacy Protection Rule ("COPPA")

• If you have questions or concerns please do not hesitate to reach out to REMC1 - support@remc1.net

Coordination of AI Tools

• It is recommended that district educators and admin coordinate which AI tools are in use

Google Gemini Facts and Considerations

Google Gemini Quick Facts

FERPA Compliant for Students 13+ and staff (for Google Education Workspaces)

• Free Gemini Chat/Gems experience OR paid licenses

• Data protections. Data is not used to improve the public AI model. Data is not human reviewed.

Districts CAN enable Gemini Free Chat experience today for 13+

Google Gemini Free vs Paid Version differences as of March 2026 (moving target)

• REMC1 can assist with obtaining quotes for the NOT-FREE options from the REMCSave Vendor for Google. Just send an email to support@remc1.net

• ALL TIERS FOR GOOGLE EDUCATION OR ENTERPRISE NOW OFFER DATA PROTECTION (FERPA)

• Gemini/Classroom/NotebookLM - free):

  • There is a limit on how many prompts you can input into the tool. The free tier offers a limit/can have a limits​ depending on what free tier AI model and tool you use (3 Pro vs 3 flash) but both tiers have limits and also have less comprehensive response possibilities/less complex questions can be answered in some cases. A comprehensive list for limitations can be found Here.

  • The free tier -

    • Gemini with Gems - https://gemini.google.com, Users are able to insert questions or prompts; e.g. "create a lesson plan for my 3rd grade history class on US presidents" -- it will then create an outline of what you've asked it to do. Coupled with gems which are specific AI bots the user can create to be “Experts” on a given subject or material with contextual memory.

    • Classroom - classroom.google.com , Teachers are able to easily create classroom items such as Rubrics, lesson plans, quizzes, and more. This content can be applied and shared to google classroom direct without the need of uploading or sharing.

    • NotebookLM - https://notebooklm.google.com/, Staff have a power tool at their disposal. LM can help with research, content “Creation” , and many more features that are drawn from content the user controls. All sources are hand picked by the user and the power of LM can use these sources to create Slide decks, Infographics, flash cards, and even podcasts.

  • The main difference with the free experience vs. the paid licenses is that this does NOT integrate Workspace apps other than Classroom. The other licenses have Gemini built into Docs, Sheets, Meets, Slides, Gmail and Drive. So it's capable of performing more actions within the suite of Google tools.

  • The Free version also uses a “lesser” model/yesterdays model that may or may not give the BEST or most COMPREHENSIVE answer as compared to the larger paid model. The lessor models are Gemini 3 Flash and 3 Pro Free tier.

  • The free tier has no Google Meet AI options

    • Can’t summarize google meets/take notes

    • Can’t use AI closed captioning and translation

    • Can’t use AI generated backgrounds

    • Can’t use AI audio enhancements (noise reduction, multiple presenter microphones simultaneously active)).

• Gemini Education Plus: (Around 6/year per license): Paid license for 13+ users. Limits on # of uses per month (hundreds of uses/month limit). Integrates with Workspace products. Advanced Meet capabilities are also available where you can have Gemini take notes for you in a meeting, or attend a meeting on your behalf if you're not able to attend. *** Requires minimum purchase of 50 licenses or total of enrolled students whichever is higher.

• Gemini Education Pro: (around 20/month per license): Paid licenses for 18+ users. No limits on usage. Integrates with Workspace products. Access to the latest and greatest google AI models.

Detailed Gemini Information

WARNING: Regarding the NON-Educational FREE version of Google Gemini

• This is for the personal free Gemini version or the NON-Ed Workspace free Gemini only

• The free version sifts through all your email and documents/sheets/slides sucking the data into its public database

• The free public/non-enterprise/educational version CAN HAVE HUMAN REVIEWERS actively looking at data and prompts you input or that Gemini ingests

• Create a burner personal account if you want to use Google Gemini. Don't use it with your normal Google Email either unless you want it to suck all your emails and drive documents into the public database (including banking, HIPAA, FERPA, PII info etc.) everything then have it cranked out to other public who ask gemini questions. There are people/bad actors who craft questions to try and reveal/pull this info back out etc.; it's an identity theft attack vector