Minors On Campus Policy
The policy that we are required to comply with is here. These policies apply to any program / event that has minors on campus who are not registered students. Our Science Olympiad event is considered a "hosted program" and does not fall into the excepion of supervision by parent / legal guardian (Section V, part B). Georgia State Unviersity FAQs on this policy are available here.
To be able to host our regional Science Olympiad event we must complete all parts of a checklist and have it approved by the Office of Risk Management. The forms we collect from Team Coaches for each student meet the "Appropriate forsm & waivers" section of this checklist. As we have events in laboratory space (even though they are purely teaching laboratories), we must also complete a laboratory release form.
Board of Regents policies and GSU policies require us to verify every form for every competitor is completed correctly before the minor arrives on campus . We are also required to store these forms in a secure (encrypted) way until each competitor turns 21 in case there is a legal case (that is the GSU attorneys view point). This means keeping some records for 7-10 years. The only way we can do this is to keep them electronically in an encrypted system (this meets the security of personal information policies for GSU). There is not enough space to keep paper copies of the forms and/or make sure they are stored in secure way.
The team form files will be uploaded to the SciLympiad site. Sending files through email is not considered a secure method for sending personal information, which is why we cannot ask for them to be sent to us this way or receive them this way.
We understand the problems associated with getting these forms completed correctly and sent in a way we can verify, however there is nothing we can do about that.
The written policies page contains the written policies relating to Minors on Campus.
There are many other forms / procedures we must also submit / follow in the checklist beyond the forms for each team attending. This is a time consuming and labor intensive task to be able to host our regional Science Olympiad event. However, we love hosting this event and will make it work each year in line with the requirements we have to meet. Please be patient with us, especially if we ask you to resubmit some forms.