This Privacy Statement describes the ways in which Harvard University may obtain personal information about individuals who use the Localist College Calendar platform managed by Harvard College Communications. 

In this Privacy Statement, “the College Calendar” refers only to the Localist calendar managed by Harvard College Communications. Harvard schools and centers have set up other Localist calendars, to which this Privacy Statement does not apply.

This Privacy Statement applies to all users of the College Calendar with College Calendar user accounts, regardless of relationship to Harvard.  Any person with a HarvardKey may create such a user account. Log in requires a user account.

Harvard College Calendar platform administrators may access the following personal information about persons with user accounts through the College Calendar:

• first name, last name, email address.
• Photo if the user provides one.
• Information about events that a user registers for through the College Calendar (event administrators will see who registers for their events).

Users can opt to let other logged-in users see what events they are attending and what places they follow, and can allow other logged-in users to view their College Calendar user profile.  

Personal information accessible by Harvard through the College Calendar also includes data related to use of the College Calendar platform, and identifiers or other information about a user’s Harvard affiliation and status.

University access to content that Harvard users create, transmit and store through the College Calendar is governed by the University Policy on Access to Electronic Information.

The personal information compiled through the College Calendar is used by Harvard event planners in connection with scheduling, gauging interest in and carrying on events.

Harvard may use the personal information for learning analytics, user access reports, and user analytics, as well as to optimize our websites and tools.

Harvard may review data on the files and resources that users access to administer the College Calendar and to provide technical support and help diagnose problems. Harvard may use and retain records of emails and other communications to support staff, in order to process inquiries about the platform, respond to user requests, and improve services.

Other uses of personal information by Harvard are described in other parts of this Privacy Statement.

The College Calendar is provided and hosted by the third-party vendor Localist. Data related to use of the Localist platform and identifiers and information about a user’s Harvard affiliation and status are released by Harvard to Localist or accessible to Localist through the platform to enable use of the platform by individuals. This includes log files of the IP addresses and browsers of computers accessing the platform and the pages visited. Localist may also have access to other personal data provided by users in the course of their use of the platform. For more information on Localist’s use of data visit the Localist privacy policy.

The College Calendar platform may also contain links to other websites.

Harvard may also share personal information with other service providers in connection with data uses described in this Privacy Statement.

Each such website and third party may have its own privacy policy.  Harvard is not responsible for the privacy practices of such third parties or websites, or for the content of such websites.

Other sharing of personal information by Harvard is described in other parts of this Privacy Statement.

In addition, Harvard may share and disclose personal information if Harvard believes that doing so is necessary or appropriate to: satisfy any applicable law, regulation, legal process or governmental request; investigate compliance with or enforce this Privacy Statement or any acceptable use policy for the College Calendar; detect, prevent or otherwise address fraud, security or technical issues; or protect, defend or enforce the operations, property, rights and safety of users, Harvard, Harvard affiliates, or others.

Cookies and related technologies (“Cookies”) may be used in the College Calendar platform to gather information when users navigate through calendar.college.harvard.edu, in order to enhance and personalize the experience, to help provide services available through the College Calendar, to analyze platform usage, and to help improve the platform and our related services. Find out more about cookies.

Some third parties may also embed Cookies in the College Calendar platform to collect information about your online activities over time and across different websites you visit. This information may be used by third parties to provide advertising tailored to your interests on other websites, apps and services you visit. 

You can review your Internet browser settings, typically under the sections “Help” or “Internet Options,” to exercise choices you have for certain Cookies or you can opt out of the collection and use of some Cookies through tools like the Network Advertising Initiative opt-out page. If you disable or delete certain Cookies in your settings, you may not be able to use features of the College Calendar.

We may use third party analytics such as Google Analytics or similar analytics services. Learn more on how Google processes and collects information using Google Analytics,  and on how to opt out.

The opt-outs described above may not work for all browsers or devices.

There are security measures in place to help protect against the loss, misuse, and alteration of the personal information under Harvard’s control. No data transmission, processing, sharing or storage by any party can be guaranteed to be completely secure.

Please contact collegecomms@fas.harvard.edu with any questions or concerns about this Privacy Statement or the College Calendar platform.

If you are located in the European Union, Iceland, Liechtenstein or Norway (the European Economic Area) or the United Kingdom, please visit Harvard’s Additional EEA Privacy Disclosures.

This Privacy Statement may be amended from time to time. Any such changes will be posted on this page.

This Privacy Statement was last updated on November 3, 2021.