Online Safety
In order for a minor to participate in online Smithsonian Summer Camp, a parent or legal
guardian must complete and sign a waiver prior to the first day of the first session.
If a parent or legal guardian is making the purchase, they will be able to sign this waiver
at checkout. For those who purchase an online camp as a gift, instructions on how to complete
the waiver will be sent to the parents or legal guardians of your gift recipient via email.
Zoom's Privacy Policy
is designed to reflect Zoom's compliance with the requirements of the Children's Online Privacy\
Protection Act (COPPA), the Federal Education Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA), the California Consumer
Privacy Act (CCPA), and other applicable laws.
The Smithsonian has licensed the education version of Zoom which has had many default settings
updated to make meetings more secure. Additionally, the Smithsonian's Office of the Chief
Information Officer (OCIO) has reviewed and updated additional default settings based on
best practices developed by Zoom and others.
For the online Smithsonian Summer Camp, and per best practices guidance from OCIO, unique meeting
links and passwords will be generated for each week-long adventure. A waiting room will be enabled
with every daily session. Names of those in the waiting room will be compared to a list of the names
of children registered for the program, and only those who are on the roster will be admitted into
the live session. Private chat activity will be disabled within the meeting and participant screen
sharing, annotation, and recording will be disabled by default. If the “breakout room” function is
used, each breakout room will have an adult in attendance.
Each online camp's landing page through the Smithsonian Summer Camp Portal is self-contained,
only accessible to registered participants behind your unique Smithsonian Associates login,
and contains only pre-approved content.
What to review before registering