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Privacy Policy

Last updated 8 September 2026

Starbound Founders is based in Fremont, California, and runs the ASCENT Venture Fellowship for high school students. This policy explains what information we collect from students and their parents or guardians, why we collect it, and who else can see it. We have tried to write it in plain language rather than legal boilerplate.

What we collect

When you apply to the fellowship

  • Student details: full name, email address, and high school.
  • Parent or guardian details: full name, email address, phone number, and billing address.
  • Payment information — see the payments section below.

When you use other forms on this site

  • Your email address, if you subscribe to our newsletter or ask to be notified about a future cohort.
  • Your name, email and organisation, if you contact us about partnering or mentoring.
  • Your name and email, if you sign up for an information session or request the program guide.

Automatically

If you arrive from a link that carries campaign tags in the address (for example utm_source), our application form records those tags so we know which channels reach families. We do not run any analytics, advertising or tracking software on this website. There is no Google Analytics, no advertising pixel, and no third-party tracker in these pages.

How we use it

  • To review applications and admit students to a cohort.
  • To contact students and parents about the program, schedule, and Demo Day.
  • To take and reconcile tuition payments.
  • To send the newsletter, if you asked for it. Every email has an unsubscribe link.
  • To understand which channels bring families to us, in aggregate.

We do not sell your information. We do not share it with advertisers. We do not use it to build profiles for anyone else.

Payments

We never see or store your card number. Checkout is handled by Stripe, which collects your payment details directly under its own privacy policy and PCI compliance. We receive only a confirmation that payment succeeded.

Who else handles your information

We keep the number of services involved deliberately small:

  • Tally — hosts our forms and stores the responses you submit.
  • Stripe — processes payments and runs our checkout.
  • Netlify — hosts this website and keeps standard server logs.
  • Calendly — schedules discovery calls, if you book one.

Each of these acts as a service provider to us and is bound by its own privacy terms. We may also disclose information if the law requires it, or where it is necessary to protect someone's safety.

Students under 18

This program is for students in grades 9 through 12, and most of them are minors. Our application form collects parent or guardian contact details alongside the student's, and we expect a parent or guardian to be involved in the decision to enrol and in the payment. We do not knowingly collect information from children under 13.

If you are a parent or guardian and you would like to see, correct, or delete information we hold about your child, write to us using the contact details below and we will act on it.

How long we keep it

We keep application and enrolment records for as long as needed to run the program and to meet our accounting and tax obligations. Newsletter subscriptions are kept until you unsubscribe. If you ask us to delete your information and we are not required to keep it, we will.

Your choices

  • You can ask what information we hold about you or your child.
  • You can ask us to correct anything that is wrong.
  • You can ask us to delete it, subject to records we are legally required to keep.
  • You can unsubscribe from the newsletter at any time using the link in any email.

California residents have specific rights under the California Consumer Privacy Act, including the right to know what personal information is collected and the right to request deletion. We do not sell personal information, so there is nothing to opt out of on that front. To exercise any of these rights, contact us below.

Cookies

This website does not set advertising or analytics cookies. Pages that embed or link to a third-party service — Tally forms and Calendly scheduling — may set cookies necessary for those services to work, governed by their own policies linked above.

Changes to this policy

If we change this policy we will update the date at the top of this page. If a change materially affects how we handle information already given to us, we will email enrolled families directly.

Contact us

Questions about this policy, or a request about your information, can go to hello@starboundfounders.com. We aim to respond within five business days.

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