Privacy Policy

I'm Undeclared ( imundeclared.com) is a college-planning tool. This Privacy Policy describes the information we collect, how we use it, and who can see it.

I'm Undeclared is operated by Fencing Forward, which launched it along with the Meredith Delgado Endowment. “We” means Fencing Forward, so it is the organization responsible for the information described here rather than an outside company we hand your data to. We do not use your college list, notes, saved portal logins, or recruiting card for fundraising, for recruiting, or to decide who receives the endowment. Donating is optional, and whether you donate does not change what we store or what you can use.

What we collect

• Account. Name, email, and a hashed password. We use these to sign you in and to send mail you ask for.
• Contact form. Name, email, and the message you send when you report a problem. We use these to reply.
• Profile.Home address (and the map coordinates we derive from it), intended majors, optional GPA, family contribution amounts, and reminder preferences. If you turn recruiting on: sport from one list, not men's vs women's (and a custom name if you pick Other); fencing weapon, rating, and ranking, or other-sport facts such as position or event, height, weight, class year, high school, club or team name, jersey numbers where the sport uses them, NCAA Eligibility Center status, and optional measures like a 40 time, UTR, wingspan, or handedness; high-school and optional club coach name and email; a short coach note; results text; a FencingTracker or stats URL; Instagram, TikTok, and X handles or profile URLs, plus an optional other social URL and label; YouTube or Vimeo links (three labeled slots plus extras you add) and optional video labels; an optional headshot; an optional card-banner photo; optional slideshow photos on the card, each with an optional short description; and card layout choices (banner color, name color, overlay, and photo crop). We store those links and photo files on the site server. We do not import stats from those sites, or upload video files.
• Your college list. Schools you add, notes, visits, decisions, aid, net-price figures, application status, optional coach-interest notes, and any portal URLs, usernames, or passwords you choose to store.
• Share links. When you create a link for a parent, counselor, or school coach, we store the role, optional label, optional recipient email, expiration date, whether you included cost details, and whether the invite email should attach the College Search and/or Costs spreadsheet. We also store a hashed network address from when you created or sent the link, and the time a recipient first opened it (parent/counselor: after they enter the access code; coach: when the card loads from a different network than yours). We do not store the raw IP. School-coach links open the recruiting card and never include family money. Application portal logins are never included.
• Session cookies. A sign-in cookie so you stay logged in. We do not use advertising cookies.

What we do with it

We use your information to run the service you signed up for:

• Fill and compare your college list.
• Look up school facts, suggest schools, and draft the note on a recruiting card or the summary on a shared plan. See the AI providers below for what each one receives.
• Estimate distance from home and show costs.
• Email a welcome note when you create an account. You do not need to confirm the address to use the site. If you delete the account from My Info, we email a cancellation note to the same address.
• Email deadline reminders if you turn them on.
• Email a password-reset link when you ask from Sign in → Forgot password.
• Email a share link when you ask us to send one. Parent and counselor plan emails include a 6-digit access code. Spreadsheets (College Search and/or Costs) attach only if you check those boxes when you create the link — the recipient can save and forward those files. Recruiting-card emails include the link and the access code, unless you made that card public.
• Show the recruiting card to a school coach when you create that link.
• Reply when you send a message from the contact page.
• Keep the site signed in and protect sign-up from bots.

We do not sell your information. We do not use it for ads.

Who else can see it

• People you share with. A parent or counselor with your link can see the read-only plan you chose to share, and any Excel files you attached to that invite. A school coach with a Recruiting-tab link sees the athlete card only — name, photos (headshot, banner, and any slideshow stills and their descriptions), major, GPA, sport notes, school and club contacts you added, social links, video links, and the layout you set. They cannot see the college plan, family money, or portal passwords. Parent and counselor plans also need the access code from the email. A recruiting card starts private with an access code; it opens from the URL alone only if you switch it to Public. Treat a plan link and code — and a private recruiting link — like a private pair until the link expires or you revoke it.
• College Scorecard / api.data.gov. We look up official school facts when you add a college.
• IPEDS (Urban Institute Education Data) and ROR. We look up a school’s registered admissions and financial-aid URLs, test scores, and phone. ROR is used for schools outside the US. We send the school, not you.
• Colleges’ own websites. To fill deadlines we fetch public admissions and financial-aid pages from the school’s site. Those requests identify our crawler and contain nothing about you.
• AI providers — OpenAI, Anthropic (Claude), and Google (Gemini). What leaves the server depends on the feature:
  • Filling school facts (deadlines, FAFSA dates, app type, program rank, campus facts such as class size, enrollment, ratio, books, and earnings when Scorecard has no number): a school name and the text of that school’s own public pages. Nothing about you.
  • Suggest schools: what you wrote in About you, your home address as you entered it, your majors, size and fencing preferences, your ranked priorities, the schools already on your list, and your family contribution per year.
  • Help write on the recruiting card: the questions you pick and the answers you type, plus your name, sport, fencing weapon/rating/ranking or other-sport facts already on the card (position, height, weight, and similar), major, GPA, results text, and the note draft on that card.
  • The summary on a shared plan: the same facts that reader is allowed to see — your list and reasons, application status, and dated to-dos. Cost and aid are included only when that reader can see cost, and are left out when you hide them.
  We never send your account password or any application portal username or password to an AI provider. Google Search grounding is used for some school lookups, which means the school name and page URL are searched. Suggestions, drafts, and filled facts from these providers are AI-generated. They can be wrong and are not official advice. Evaluate them for accuracy and appropriateness — including human review where it matters — before you use or share them. See the Terms of Use for that disclaimer.
• OpenStreetMap Nominatim and OSRM. We send your home address (or a place name) to geocode it and to estimate driving distance.
• Amazon SES. Welcome, account-canceled, reminder, password-reset, and contact mail is sent from [email protected]. Share invites are sent from [email protected].
• Cloudflare Turnstile. The sign-in, sign-up, and contact-form check runs in your browser to reduce bots.
• Stripe. Donating is optional and is not required for an account. Payment happens on Stripe’s page, under Stripe’s privacy policy. Stripe collects the card or bank details. We do not see or store your card number. We may receive a receipt with your name, email, and the amount so we know the gift went through.
• Fencing Forward staff. The people who run this site can post sponsor names and logos on a public Sponsors page when that page is turned on. They can see account emails and whether you created or emailed a share link, so they can keep the service working. They do not need your portal passwords for that, and this policy asks them not to browse private list details unless needed for support or security. Staff may also ban an account (sign-in is blocked; the list stays) or delete it the same way you can from My Info.

Your data is stored on a private server operated for this site, not on a public cloud database.

How long we keep it

We keep your account and list until you delete them, or until staff delete the account for support or safety. On My Info, use the Delete account card (password plus typing DELETE). That removes your account, college list, to-dos, share links, reminder history, and any recruiting headshot or banner photo files. We then email a cancellation note to the address that was on the account. You can also email [email protected] from the address on the account. Shared school facts other people use stay in the cache.

Children

The site is meant for students applying to college and the adults helping them. It is not directed at children under 13. If you are under 18, a parent or guardian should know you have an account, especially before you store portal passwords or share a plan or recruiting card.

Your choices

• You can edit your profile, list, and share links while signed in.
• You can turn reminder email off in My Info.
• You can revoke a share link at any time.
• You can delete your account from My Info, or email us as described above.

Changes

If this policy changes in a material way, we will update the date at the top of this page.

Contact

Questions about privacy, or a request to see or delete your data, go to Fencing Forward, operator of I'm Undeclared: [email protected].