Privacy Policy

Last Updated: May, 24, 2018

 

PA College Prep is committed to protecting your privacy and developing technology that gives you the most powerful and safe online experience. This Statement of Privacy applies to the PA College Prep website (www.pacollegeprep.com) and governs data collection and usage. By using the PA College Prep website, you consent to the data practices described in this statement.
 

What Information do we collect?

 

Automatic collection of information. Like many websites on the Internet, we automatically gather certain non-personally identifiable information and store it in log files. This information may include, for example, your IP address, browser type, and Internet connection speed. In addition, we may employ the use of “cookies” in certain areas of our Site. We use this information, which does not identify individual users through such users’ personally-identifiable information (PII) defined as data that we collect that could identify a single individual (including names, email addresses, postal addresses, and phone numbers), but does differentiate between users (as described in greater detail below) to analyze trends, to administer the site, to track users’ movements around the site, and to gather demographic information about our user base as a whole. We may link this automatically collected data to other information we collect about you.

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Technologies such as cookies, beacons, tags and scripts are used by PA College Prep and our partners, affiliates, or service providers. These technologies are used in analyzing trends, administering the Site, tracking users’ movements around the Site and to gather demographic information about our user base as a whole. We may receive reports based on the use of these technologies by these companies on an individual as well as aggregated basis.

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Cookies.

 

We may collect information using “cookies.” Cookies are small data files stored on the hard drive of your computer or mobile device by a website. We may use both session cookies (which expire once you close your web browser) and persistent cookies (which stay on your computer or mobile device until you delete them) to provide you with a more personal and interactive experience on the Site.

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We use two broad categories of cookies: (1) first party cookies, served directly by us to your computer or mobile device, which we use to recognize your computer or mobile device when it revisits the Site; and (2) third party cookies, which are served by service providers on the Site, and can be used by such service providers to recognize your computer or mobile device when it visits other websites.

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Cookies we use.

Our Site uses the following types of cookies for the purposes set out below:

 

Type of cookie

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• Essential Cookies

These cookies are essential to provide you with services available through the PA College Prep Site and to enable you to use some of its features. Without these cookies, the services that you have asked for cannot be provided, and we only use these cookies to provide you with those services.

• Functionality Cookies

These cookies allow our Site to remember choices you make when you use the Site. The purpose of these cookies is to provide you with a more personal experience and to avoid you having to re-enter your preferences every time you visit the Site.

• Analytics and Performance Cookies

These cookies are used to collect information about traffic to the PA College Prep Site and how users use our Site and Services. The information gathered may include the number of visitors to our Site, the websites that referred them to our Site, the pages they visited on our Site, what time of day they visited our Site, whether they have visited our Site before, and other similar information.  We use this information to help operate our Site more efficiently, to gather broad demographic information, monitor the level of activity on our Site, and improve the Site. The information gathered does not identify any individual visitor. The information is aggregated and anonymous.

We use Google Analytics for this purpose. Google Analytics uses its own cookies. You can find out more information about Google Analytics cookies here and about how Google protects your data here.  You can prevent the use of Google Analytics relating to your use of our Site by downloading and installing the browser plugin available here.

• Advertising or Marketing Cookies

These cookies are used to identify Site visitors that are either known or unknown to enhance the experience they have on our Site. These cookies allow us to provide content that is personalized to match visitors’ browsing history.

 

We are using WIX(www.wix.com) as PA College Prep website domain, hosting and design service. Cookies that WIX uses:

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Disabling cookies.

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You can typically remove or reject cookies via your browser settings. In order to do this, follow the instructions provided by your browser (usually located within the “settings,” “help” “tools” or “edit” facility).  Many browsers are set to accept cookies until you change your settings.

Further information about cookies, including how to see what cookies have been set on your computer or mobile device and how to manage and delete them, visit www.allaboutcookies.org.

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If you do not accept our cookies, you may experience some inconvenience in your use of our Site. For example, we may not be able to recognize your computer or mobile device and you may need to log in every time you visit our Site.

Do Not Track Signals.

Some Internet browsers may be configured to send “Do Not Track” signals to the online services that you visit. We currently do not currently respond to do not track signals. To find out more about “Do Not Track,” please visit http://www.allaboutdnt.com.

 

Information You Enter.

 

We also collect information you choose to provide us through the Site or via email. For example, we obtain information when you create an account, complete a registration form or feedback form, contact us requesting information, purchase our Services, respond to a survey, contact a customer support representative, or opt-in to provide information to one or more of our affiliates through the Site.

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This information may include information about you (for example, your name, email address, postal address, phone number), information about your institution (for example, a school’s name and address), and other information (for example, your graduation year and certain demographic information, when not associated with your personally-identifiable information). We may also collect other information not sourced from Credentials, including test scores (e.g. SAT, GRE, etc.), which may be collected if you choose to use certain admissions tools available through the Site.  If requested by your school in order to correctly identify your Credentials, we may request additional personal information from you, which may include the last four digits of your social security number.

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When you use the Services offered on the Site, we may collect information regarding your use of the Services, including any communications made or transactions entered into by you.

You can choose not to provide us with certain information, but then you may not be able to successfully use the Services or take full advantage of the features of our Site.

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If you provide us personal information about others, or if others give us your information, we will only use that information for the specific reason for which it was provided to us.

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We collect feedback and correspondence from you, including information you provide in your responses to surveys, when you participate in market research activities, report a problem with the Site, receive customer support, or otherwise correspond with us.

 

Information We Get from Others.

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We may also get information about you from other sources, for example, if you have agreed to share information with one of our partners for purposes of the electronic ordering, fulfillment, and delivery of academic credentials and data or other use related to the Services. We may add this to information we get from you in our Services.

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We may combine other publicly available information, such as information related to the organization for which you work, with the personal information that you provide to us through our Services.

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Changes to Your Personal Information.

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It is important that the personal information we hold about you is accurate and current.  Please let us know if your personal information changes during your relationship with us by updating your account information or emailing us at info@pacollegeprep.com

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Why do we collect your information and how is it used?

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In general, we use information that we collect (i) to efficiently provide our Services, (ii) to improve your experience in using the Site and our Services, (iii) to aid in communication between PA College Prep and you, and (iv) to notify you of Services that we think may be of interest to you.

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Personal or Institution Information.

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Any personal information that we collect is used to (i) facilitate the provision of Services that you may order and any related transactions and to further operate and improve our Services, (ii) personalize your account, (iii) maintain and customize the Services, (iv) develop new products and services, (v) allow communication between PA College Prep (its affiliates and service providers) and you, (vi) send administrative or service related emails, and marketing emails about upcoming products or services, which you may opt out of receiving as set forth below, (vii) provide support and maintenance for the Site and our Services, (viii) respond to your service-related requests, questions, and feedback, and (viii) as we believe necessary or appropriate (a) to comply with applicable laws; (b) to comply with lawful requests and legal process, including to respond to requests from public and government authorities; (c) to enforce our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use; and (d) to protect our rights, privacy, safety or property and that of you or others, and (e) to protect, investigate, and deter against fraudulent, harmful, unauthorized, unethical or illegal activity.

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We will request your consent to use your personal information where required by law, such as where we use certain cookies or similar technologies or would like to send you certain marketing messages.  If we request your consent to use your personal information, you have the right to withdraw your consent any time in the manner indicated when we requested the consent or by contacting us.

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Anonymous Data.

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We may create anonymous data from your personal information and other individuals whose personal information we collect.  We make personal information into anonymous data by excluding information that makes the data personally identifiable to you.

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Sensitive Personal Data.

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We do not collect and we ask that you do not send us or disclose any sensitive personal data (e.g. information related to racial or ethnic origin, political opinions, religious or other beliefs, health, biometrics, or criminal background) on or through the Services. If you send or disclose any sensitive personal data to us when you submit user generated content in our Services, you consent to our processing and use of such sensitive personal data in accordance with this Privacy Policy. If you do not consent to our processing and use of such sensitive personal data, you must not submit such user generated content in our Services.

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Anonymous Information.

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We may use anonymous information in aggregate form to provide institutions with analytics on Credential exchange activity through the Services, including analysis to track where requests are coming from and going to, and benchmarking information. Additionally, we may use anonymous information in aggregate form to provide users with certain admissions-related analytics. These analytics rely solely on aggregated, anonymized data, and do not include any data from the Credentials we process.

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We may use a third party to assist us in collecting and analyzing information as described below.

In addition, we use that anonymous data for our lawful business purposes.

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How we share your information?

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Our business hinges on security and the trust you place in us. We take great care to ensure that your personally identifiable information is only shared in the following limited circumstances:

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  • Designated Institutions or Third Parties. When a student, academic institution, or other user uses our Services, we will access certain data, including personal information, and may transmit, fulfill, or otherwise disclose Credentials and related data to such other academic institutions or third parties as authorized by such user. The consent of a student-user’s parent may be required to submit a Credential request for non-postsecondary students under the age of 18. We will share certain information with the institutions from which we obtain your Credentials in order to fulfill your order.

  • Service providers. We may also use other companies and individuals to perform supporting functions on our behalf for the institutions that we work with or for the various Services offered through the Site, such as account billing and processing. They handle data only in compliance with the terms of this Privacy Policy, and will not be permitted to use the information collected from you for any purpose other than performing the support functions for PA College Prep.

  • Affiliates. We may disclose your personal information to our subsidiaries and corporate affiliates or business partners for purposes consistent with this Privacy Policy. 

• Professional Advisors. We may disclose your personal information to professional advisors, such as lawyers, bankers, auditors, and insurers, where necessary in the course of the professional services they render to us.

• Academic Research. We may share anonymous data with researchers at academic institutions for academic research purposes, including the study of topics of relevance to the admissions process, college access, and labor market outcomes. Researchers and academic institutions are only permitted to handle such data in compliance with the terms of a restricted use agreement with PA College Prep; additionally, such academic institutions must be accredited and the research must be IRB-approved.

• Protection of rights. We may disclose your information if we believe that such action is appropriate to: (i) comply with law or any lawful requests and legal process, such as to respond to subpoenas or requests from government authorities, (ii) enforce the Terms of Use Agreement for the Site or this Privacy Policy, (iii) respond to claims that any information or content posted on our site or transmitted through the use of the Services violates the rights of any third party, or (iv) protect the rights, privacy, property, or personal safety of PA College Prep, its affiliates and employees, other Site users or others, or (v) protect, investigate, and deter against fraudulent, harmful, unauthorized, unethical or illegal activity. .

• Business transfers. PA College Prep may sell, transfer, or otherwise share your information to an acquirer, assignee or other successor entity in connection with the transfer or sale of all or substantially all of the equity, business, or assets of PA College Prep to which your information relates, or in connection with a sale, merger, bankruptcy, reorganization, change in control, or other similar transaction.

 

International Data Transfer

 

We are headquartered in the United States and may have business partners or members in other countries, and your personal information may be transferred to the United States or other locations outside of your state, province, country or other governmental jurisdiction where privacy laws may not be as protective as those in your jurisdiction.

 

European Union users should read the important information provided here about transfer of personal information outside of the European Economic Area.

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Storage of information

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Once a Credential request has been fulfilled, PA College Prep does not retain such Credential, unless requested by the individual user, the sending institution, or the receiving institution, for the convenience of such user. For example, it is PA College Prep’s policy to comply with the sending institution’s preferences until the Credential is delivered. After the Credential is delivered, PA College Prep follows the receiver’s preferences regarding the retention and analysis of the transmitted Credential. If an individual user requests PA College Prep retain their Credentials on their behalf, PA College Prep will comply with such request and maintain the Credentials on behalf of such user in their personal account.

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Your Choices

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You can review, correct, update, or delete the information you provide PA College Prep by signing in to your account and accessing the Profile tab. Account holders may also contact us at info@pacollegeprep.com to accomplish the foregoing or if you have additional requests or questions. If you request that we delete your information, please note that your information may continue to reside in our backup systems.

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From time to time, PA College Prep may provide you information on its various Services through email, telephone solicitations, and/or postal mail. You can opt-out of receiving these types of communications or access your personal information by clicking on an unsubscribe link at the bottom of each such email, or by contacting us at info@pacollegeprep.com . You may continue to receive service-related and other non-marketing emails.

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If you have opted in to receive communication offered from third parties through PA College Prep, please contact each such party for information about their available opt-out procedures. We are unable to opt you out of third party marketing programs.

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We will retain your information for as long as your account is active or as needed to provide you Services. We will retain and use your information as necessary to comply with our legal obligations, resolve disputes, and enforce our agreements.

Where we are required by law to collect your personal information, or where we need your personal information in order to provide the Services to you, if you do not provide this information when requested (or you later ask to delete it), we may not be able to provide you with the Services and may need to close your account.  We will tell you what information you must provide to receive the Services by designating it as required in the Services or through other appropriate means.

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Security

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We use industry-standard technology designed to protect your information and all transmissions made through our Site, and take reasonable measures to protect the confidentiality, security and integrity of personally identifiable information collected on our Site. Below are some of the highlights. However, no security safeguards are 100% secure and we cannot guarantee the security of your information.

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The personal or institution identifiable information that you provide us is stored in secured facilities with restricted access, and protected by protocols and procedures designed to ensure the security of such information. In addition, all individuals who have access to such information are trained in the maintenance and security of such information, and we limit access of such information by our employees to the minimum information reasonably required in order to provide prompt, high quality Services.

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When you enter sensitive information, such as your social security number, on our forms, we encrypt the transmission of that information using secure socket layer technology (SSL). We follow generally accepted standards to protect the personal information submitted to us, both during transmission and once we receive it.  No method of transmission over the Internet, or method of electronic storage, is 100% secure, however. Therefore, we cannot guarantee its absolute security. If you have any questions about security on our website, you can Contact Us.

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If you create an account, you are responsible for maintaining the confidentiality of your account password and for activity that occurs under your account credentials.  Please Contact Us if there are any unauthorized uses of your account or other breaches of security.

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Third Party Services

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Our Site includes links to other websites and services whose privacy practices may differ from those of PA College Prep. These links are not an endorsement, authorization, or representation that we are affiliated with that third party. We do not exercise control over third party websites or services, and are not responsible for their actions. If you submit personal information to any of those sites, your information is governed by their privacy policies. We encourage you to carefully read the privacy policy of any site you visit.

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Some of our partners may utilize framing techniques to serve content to and from webpages accessible through our Site while preserving the look and feel of our site. Please be aware that you are providing your personal information to these third parties and not to PA College Prep.

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If you opt in to provide information to a third party whose services may be introduced by PA College Prep (e.g., through a site that is not owned or controlled by PA College Prep), please be aware that such collection of information is governed by the privacy statement of such third party.   

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Blog

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Our Site offers publicly accessible blogs or community forums. You should be aware that any information you provide in these areas may be read, collected, and used by others who access them. To request removal of your personal information from our blog or community forum, please Contact Us. In some cases, we may not be able to remove your personal information, in which case we will let you know if we are unable to do so and why.

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Testimonials

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We may display personal testimonials of satisfied customers on our site in addition to other endorsements. With your consent, we may post your testimonial along with your name.  If you wish to update or delete your testimonial, please Contact Us.

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Social Media Widgets

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Our Site includes social media features, such as the Facebook Like button and widgets, such as the ShareThis button or interactive mini-programs that run on our Site. These features may collect your IP address, which page you are visiting on our Site, and may set a cookie to enable the feature to function properly. Social media features and widgets are either hosted by a third party or hosted directly on our Site. Your interactions with these features are governed by the privacy policy of the company providing such feature.

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Single Sign-On

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You can log in to our Site using sign-in services such as Facebook Connect or an Open ID provider. These services will authenticate your identity and provide you the option to share certain personal information with us, such as your name and email address, to pre-populate our sign-up form. Services like Facebook Connect give you the option to post information about your activities on this Site to your profile page to share with others within your network. If you connect to such services through our Site you authorize us to access, use and store the information that you agreed the services could provide to us based on your settings on that service. We will access, use and store that information in accordance with this Privacy Policy. You can revoke our access to the information you provide in this way at any time by amending the appropriate settings from within your account settings on the applicable service.

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Children’s privacy

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Our Site is a general audience website and no portion of the Site is directed to children under the age of 13. We do not collect personally identifiable information from any person we know is a child under the age of 13.

Should we be alerted that we have inadvertently collected personally identifiable information from a child under the age of 13, we will take steps to immediately delete it.

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If you are a resident of California and under the age of 18, you may remove any content that you have posted to our Site. In the event you cannot remove the content, you may request for PA College Prep to remove the content by using PA College Prep’s “Contact Us” form at https://www.pacollegeprep.com/cotactus . Please note that the removal of content or information from our Site does not ensure complete or comprehensive removal of the content or information posted on our Site.

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Modifications

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At PA College Prep, protecting your privacy is important to us. By accessing and using our Site, you consent to the collection, use and disclosure of information by www.pacollegeprep.com us as described in this Privacy Policy. We reserve the right to modify the Privacy Policy at any time. The “Last Updated” legend above indicates when this Privacy Policy was last modified. Although this Privacy Policy is subject to change from time to time, we will display a notice on the Site of any material change at least thirty (30) days prior to implementation of the revised Privacy Policy. We may also notify you by email in the event of such material change. If you have any questions concerning this policy please send an email to the Site Administrator from the link found on the Contact Us page.

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Any modifications to this Privacy Policy will be effective upon our posting of the new terms and/or upon implementation of the new changes on the Services (or as otherwise indicated at the time of posting). In all cases, your continued use of the Services after the posting of any modified Privacy Policy indicates your acceptance of the terms of the modified Privacy Policy.

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EU-U.S. Privacy Shield

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PA College Prep complies or will comply with the EU-U.S. Privacy Shield Framework as set forth by the U.S. Department of Commerce regarding the collection, use, and retention of personal data transferred from the EU to the United States, upon our self-certification approval and certification to the Department of Commerce that we adhere to the Privacy Shield Principles. If there is any conflict between the terms in this Privacy Policy and the Privacy Shield Principles, the Privacy Shield Principles shall govern.  To learn more about the Privacy Shield program, the Privacy Shield Principles, please visit www.privacyshield.gov.

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As described in the Privacy Shield Principles, PA College Prep is accountable for personal data that it receives and subsequently transfers to third parties. If third parties that process personal data on our behalf as an authorized agent of PA College Prep, do so in a manner that does not comply with this Privacy Policy, we are accountable, unless we prove that we are not responsible for the event giving rise to the damage.

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In compliance with the Privacy Shield Principles, PA College Prep commits to resolve complaints about our collection or use of your personal data.  EU individuals with inquiries or complaints regarding this Policy should first contact us at: info@pacollegeprep.com

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PA College Prep commits to cooperate with the panel established by the EU data protection authorities (DPAs) and comply with the advice given by the panel with regard to personal data transferred from the EU. Please contact us to be directed to the relevant DPA contacts.

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Contact Us

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If you have any questions or concerns at all about our Privacy Policy, please feel free to email us at info@pacollegeprep.com or write to us at:

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PA College Prep

4947 Alton Pkwy, Irvine, CA92604, USA