What legal mandates must school social workers follow regarding student confidentiality?

The Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) is the correct legal mandate that school social workers must follow regarding student confidentiality. FERPA protects the privacy of student education records and grants parents and eligible students certain rights concerning those records, including the right to access and seek amendments to them. School social workers must adhere to FERPA regulations when handling, sharing, or disclosing any information contained in a student's educational records to ensure that they are respecting students' privacy rights.

In this context, HIPAA pertains primarily to the protection of medical records and health information, which is not directly applicable to educational records unless a student is receiving specific federally-funded health services. The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) addresses accessibility and discrimination based on disability but does not specifically govern the confidentiality of student information. The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) focuses on the rights of students with disabilities to receive a free appropriate public education and mandates certain procedures for evaluating and serving these students, but it is FERPA that specifically sets forth the rules surrounding the confidentiality of educational records.