ROTCScholar

What we collect

When you submit a form (newsletter signup, match tool, compare PDF request, or contact form), we collect your email address and any preferences you provide (branch interest, year in school, state of residence, scholarship status, intended major, etc.). We use standard analytics tools (Google Analytics, PostHog) which place cookies and collect anonymous interaction data.

How we use it

To send you the newsletter and any reminders you opted into
To respond to your contact form messages
To improve the site through aggregate analytics
To segment our subscriber list for relevant content (you can unsubscribe any time)

Community-intelligence aggregation

ROTCScholar analyzes publicly available community discussions (Reddit, Service Academy Forums, College Confidential, Quora) in aggregate to inform our editorial direction and surface the questions prospective cadets are actually asking. We do not republish posts, we do not store usernames or identifying information, and we paraphrase any example questions we surface. Raw post text and HTML are discarded immediately after extraction; only aggregate metrics persist.

If a forum operator objects, we stop scraping that source immediately. We rate-limit aggressively and respect robots.txt.

COPPA & minors

Email capture forms are gated to 13 and older. If you are under 18, we ask for a parent email and only contact the parent.

CAN-SPAM & consent

All marketing email contains an unsubscribe link. We default partner-share consent to off — your information is not shared with third-party advertisers unless you explicitly opt in.

Where we store data

PocketBase is our system of record. Email is sent via Resend. Images are served from Google Cloud Storage. We do not sell user data.

Contact

For data requests, deletion, or any privacy concern, use our contact form.