Confidentiality

Stanford University strives to provide a place of work and study free of sexual harassment, intimidation or exploitation. Where sexual harassment has occurred, the University will act to stop the harassment, prevent its recurrence, and discipline and/or take other appropriate action against those responsible. See also: Sexual Harassment Policy Office website.

This Guide Memo outlines Stanford University's definitions and policies relating to sexual misconduct, sexual assault, stalking and relationship violence for all members of the Stanford community. This Guide Memo also defines student-on-student sexual harassment (see also Guide Memo 1.7.1, Sexual Harassment in the Workplace). Finally, this policy applies to violations of University directives or court orders and acts of intimidation/retaliation relating to the aforementioned conduct or allegations of conduct. This conduct is prohibited by Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 relating to sexual harassment (including sexual violence, stalking, and domestic and dating violence), the Violence Against Women Reauthorization Act of 2013 (VAWA) and its implementing regulations, and California Education Code sections 67380, 67383 and 67386; Stanford University refers to this collective group of misconduct as Prohibited Sexual Conduct. In conjunction with this Guide Memo, Stanford has disciplinary and administrative procedures for making formal determinations of whether Prohibited Sexual Conduct has occurred, which are described in Section 11 of this Guide Memo. Prohibited Sexual Conduct is a severe form of sexual harassment.

The University maintains lists of names, addresses, telephone numbers and electronic mail accounts of individuals and organizations of importance to the University. This Guide Memo sets forth policies concerning use of such University data and describes the major lists used to conduct the University's business.

Stanford University has an interest in ensuring that the privacy of its students, faculty, and staff is respected. The University is committed to protecting the privacy of Prohibited, Restricted and Confidential Information within its control in a manner consistent with applicable laws, regulations and University policies.

The policies in this Guide Memo are fundamental to Stanford University's employment policies.

This Guide Memo describes Stanford University's implementation of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 ("HIPAA") and its regulations ("Privacy Rule" and "Security Rule") governing the protection of identifiable health information by health care providers and health plans. The portions of Stanford University that are impacted by HIPAA include the Stanford University HIPAA Components and the Group Health Plan, defined in Sections 3 and 4, respectively.

This Guide Memo references Stanford University HIPAA Components policies on the University HIPAA website and the Group Health Plan HIPAA policies. The Group Health Plan maintains HIPAA policies and procedures in the Resource Library section of the Benefits website. These policies outline more specific rights of individuals regarding their protected health information ("PHI") as well as the operational and system requirements to comply with the Privacy and Security Rules.

The University maintains personnel information for each employee in order to have a complete, accurate and current record of the employee's salary and job history at the University. This guide memo sets forth policies and procedures to facilitate the establishment, use and maintenance of personnel data, in whatever form maintained.