FGCU admissions rule allows for rejection based on student’s health

Leslie Williams Hale reports:

At the intersection of health privacy laws and student privacy laws in Florida stand the students themselves.

Before a student in Florida can sign up for classes, he or she must provide a medical history to the state university. That medical history is often a simple list of required vaccinations.

However at Florida schools, including at Florida Gulf Coast University in Estero, that medical history can be used to deny a student from registering for classes.

A regulation passed by the Board of Trustees earlier this year at FGCU states that the university “reserves the right to refuse registration to any student whose health record or report of medical examination indicates the existence of a condition which may be harmful to members of the university community.”