Baobab is an online community of educators, mentors and scholars interested in sharing ideas and information. Baobab is provided by Mastercard Foundation (“MCF”, “we”, “us”, “our”) as part of Mastercard Foundation Scholars Program and hosted by Arizona State University (“Hosts”). We take your privacy very seriously and want to explain to you how we treat your personal information at Baobab.

How and Why We Collect Information About You

Forms and Site Activities

We collect information about you either through forms that you fill out on Baobab, postings you make on Baobab, and generally from your activities on the site, including photographs and videos you post, messages or communication with others, your mobile phone or computer device information, the groups and individuals you are connected to within Baobab and how you interact with them. We also collect content and information that other people provide when they use Baobab, including information about you, such as when they share a photo of you, or send a message to you. This can include information in or about the content you provide, such as the location of a photograph or the date a file was created.

This information is collected to create your user account, help verify accounts and activity, to make the site’s functions work for you, to administer your user account, to communicate with you (including to send service messages to you), and to investigate suspicious activity or violations of our Terms of Service and policies. We also use this information to provide shortcuts and suggestions to you and information regarding events in your location.

Usage information

To understand and improve Baobab site usage, we also collect and aggregate, usage information through third party tools to understand the pages visited, the order of the visits, time of visits and the hyperlinks that are clicked by users. Some of this usage information is collected through “Cookies” (small text files placed on your computer that store information about you). A Cookie may remain on your computer, phone or browser (depending on how you access Baobab) even after you are logged off. Your browser should provide you with the ability to control how and whether Cookies will be accepted. For example, most browsers offer instructions on how to reset the browser to reject cookies in the “Help” section of the toolbar. However, if you reject our cookies, many functions and conveniences of Baobab may not work properly. We use cookies to verify your account information, for security and site integrity, and for analytics and research.

Google Analytics

This website uses Google Analytics, a web analysis service provided by Google Inc., to collect information about your use of the Site, which your web browser automatically sends to Google. This information includes the URLs of the websites that you visit and your IP address. Google may also set cookies or read preexisting cookies. This information is stored on Google's servers. Google uses this information to provide us with reports about website traffic and your visits to the website (for example, the domain from which you access the Internet, the web address of the website from which you linked to the Site, and the date and time of your visit to the websites that you view and click through). We will use this data to improve the website's structure and content. By providing your consent to the collection, use and disclosure of your personal information when you create your Baobab user account, you agree that Google may use this data in accordance with its Privacy Policy, which is located at http://www.google.com/policies/privacy. For more information on how Google uses your data, visit http://www.google.com/policies/privacy/partners. You may opt out of our use of Google Analytics by visiting the Google Analytics opt-out website at http://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout and installing the Google Analytics Opt-Out Browser Add-On. Please remember that you will need to opt out for each browser you use.

Research Projects

Part of the Baobab community includes academic researchers. As we mentioned in our Terms of Service, researchers may study the behavior of users on Baobab, including you, to learn more about how people use and benefit from on-line communities so that we can improve Baobab and other on-line social media platforms.

In addition, from time-to-time, a researcher may contact you to survey you as a member of Baobab or to ask you to participate in a study. Your participation in this type of survey or research study is entirely voluntary and you will never have to complete a survey or any research study to continue to participate in Baobab.

For all research projects, your personal information will never be disclosed in a research report and the results of any research will be reported anonymously. Research projects are also subject to prior approval of the researcher’s applicable research ethics board.

Sharing Your Information with Others

Baobab is an open community and your profile and posts are available to all community members, so please be careful and use discretion and good judgment when deciding whether to submit or post any information on Baobab. Remember that other Baobab users may share content about you with the audience they choose, either on Baobab or off. For example, people may post re-share (on or off Baobab) a photo that you have posted, mention you at a location in a post, or share information about you that you shared with them.

You can rest assured that we will never sell, rent or give your personal information to anyone for commercial use.

We may also provide your personal information to third parties as follows:

• To Arizona State University, to host this site for us;

• To other academic institutions and non-governmental organizations conducting research studies if you have provided your opt in consent;

• To notify other users about your posts if they have subscribed to a topic that you have commented on;

• As required or permitted by applicable laws in Canada and the United States and other countries where your personal information may be stored; and

• In the event our operations are transferred to another organization, to the recipient organization so that it can continue to make Baobab available to you.

Whenever we do provide your personal information to third parties, we will require that those third parties handle and protect your personal information as described in this Privacy Policy.

Where Your Information Is Located

Sometimes we store and process your personal information in the United States and other countries that we determine are the best locations for the most efficient operation of Baobab. As a result, your personal information may be located in countries that protect personal information in a way that is different than in your own country and may be subject to access requests in those jurisdictions according to laws in those jurisdictions. We respect the laws of those countries and sometimes we are required by law to hand over the information to their law enforcement authorities.

Your consent for us to collect, use and share your personal information means that you also give us permission to store and process your personal information in the United States and these other countries. If you have any questions or concerns about how your information is stored or processed outside of your country of residence, please contact our Privacy Officer at concerns@baobabplatform.org.

Consent

When you create your Baobab user account we will ask for your consent to collect, use, and share your personal information for the reasons that we have outlined in this Privacy Policy.

You are free to withdraw your consent at any time. However, if you do withdraw your consent we will have to close your user account because Baobab is an open community that needs personal information from every Baobab user to make the site function properly.

As noted earlier regarding academic research projects where you are contacted by the researcher to participate, your participation is voluntary; you will be asked to provide your opt in consent to participate in those projects.

Links to Other Websites

Baobab may contain links to third party websites that we do not control. These third party websites have their own privacy policies. We are not responsible for the collection, use and disclosure of your information by those websites. Be careful when you click these links and are redirected to a third party website – make sure to review the privacy policies of each website you visit and use.

Security of Your Personal Information

We regularly review our privacy and security policies, processes, and procedures to make sure your information is safe and that no one can gain unauthorized access to it or modify it. We take reasonable precautions and have established administrative, physical, and technical safeguards that reasonably and appropriately protect your personal information.

However, please be aware that no method of transmission over the Internet, or method of electronic storage, is 100% secure; and therefore, we cannot guarantee its absolute security.

Accessing, Updating, and Correcting Your Information

It is important that the information you provide us is accurate and up-to-date so we can provide you with the best experience on Baobab. If any of your information changes or is inaccurate, please update it through your user account or contact us at the information below so we can make the changes.

There may be situations where we cannot grant you access to your personal information. We may deny access when required or authorized to by the law, such as when granting you access would impact other people’s privacy or when it is necessary to protect confidential commercial information. If we deny your request for access or refuse to correct your information, we will tell you why.

You may deactivate or delete your user Account at any time as described in our Terms of Service, available here.

Changes to Our Privacy Policy

We may make changes to this Privacy Policy from time to time. When changes are made, these changes will be effective immediately upon posting the amended Privacy Policy on Baobab. If you access or use Baobab after any changes have been made, this means you agree to the modified Privacy Policy including all the changes. Please return to this page periodically so you are familiar with the most current version of this Privacy Policy.

Contact Us

If you have any questions or privacy concerns, including accessing and correcting your information, or if you are unhappy with our information practices, please contact our Privacy Officer at: concerns@baobabplatform.org.