Pupil Privacy Notice – Stanah Primary School

How we use pupil information

Under data protection law, individuals have a right to be informed about how the school uses any personal data that we hold about them. We comply with this right by providing ‘privacy notices’ (sometimes called ‘fair processing notices’) to individuals where we are processing their personal data.

This privacy notice explains how we collect, store and use personal data about pupils.

We, Stanah Primary School, are the ‘data controller’ for the purposes of data protection law.

Our data protection officer is Mrs R Legge.

The categories of pupil information that we process include:

personal identifiers and contacts (such as name, unique pupil number, contact details and address)
characteristics (such as ethnicity, language, and free school meal eligibility)
safeguarding information (such as court orders and professional involvement)
special educational needs (including the needs and ranking)
medical and administration (such as doctors information, child health, dental health, allergies, medication and dietary requirements)
attendance (such as sessions attended, number of absences, absence reasons and any previous schools attended)
assessment and attainment (such as key stage 1 and phonics results, post 16 courses enrolled for and any relevant results)
behavioural information (such as exclusions and any relevant alternative provision put in place)
Trips and Visit consent
Photograph and social media consent
Catering
Free School Meal and Pupil premium information
where applicable, we will obtain Early Help Assessments (EHA), TAF, Child Protection Plans and Health Care Plans from social care, education, health care and other child care and family professionals.

We may also hold data about pupils that we have received from other organisations including other schools, local authorities and the Department of Education.

Why we collect and use pupil information

We collect and use pupil information, for the following purposes:

to support pupil learning
to monitor and report on pupil attainment progress
to provide appropriate pastoral care
to assess the quality of our services
to keep children safe (food allergies, or emergency contact details)
to meet the statutory duties placed upon us for the Department for Education (DfE) data collections
to comply with the law regarding data sharing

The lawful basis on which we use this information

On the 25th May 2018 the Data Protection Act 1998 will be replaced by the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). The condition for processing under the GDPR will be:

Article 6

Processing shall be lawful only if and to the extent that at least one of the following applies:

Article 9

Processing of personal data revealing racial or ethnic origin, political opinions, religious or philosophical beliefs, or trade union membership, and the processing of genetic data, biometric data for the purpose of uniquely identifying a natural person, data concerning health or data concerning a natural person’s sex life or sexual orientation shall be prohibited.
Paragraph 1 shall not apply if one of the following applies:

(j) Processing is necessary for archiving purposes in the public interest, scientific or historical research purposes or statistical purposes in accordance with Article 89(1) based on Union or Member State law which shall be proportionate to the aim pursued, respect the essence of the right to data protection and provide for suitable and specific measures to safeguard the fundamental rights and the interests of the data subject.

The Education (Information about Individual Pupils) (England) Regulations 2013 – Regulation 5 ‘Provision of information by non-maintained special schools and Academies to the Secretary of State’ states ‘Within fourteen days of receiving a request from the Secretary of State, the proprietor of a non-maintained special school or an Academy (shall provide to the Secretary of State such of the information referred to in Schedule 1 and (where the request stipulates) in respect of such categories of pupils, or former pupils, as is so requested.’

The Education Act 1996 – Section 537A – states that we provide individual pupil information as the relevant body such as the Department for Education.

Children’s Act 1989 – Section 83 – places a duty on the Secretary of State or others to conduct research.

Collecting pupil information

We collect pupil information via Admission Forms and Common Transfer Documents (CTF) sent electronically from other schools.

Pupil data is essential for the schools’ operational use. Whilst the majority of pupil information you provide to us is mandatory, some of it requested on a voluntary basis. In order to comply with the data protection legislation, we will inform you at the point of collection, whether you are required to provide certain pupil information to us or if you have a choice in this.

Storing pupil data

We keep personal information about pupils while they are attending our school. We may also keep it beyond their attendance at our school if this is necessary in order to comply with our legal obligations. We follow the guidance outlined in the Information and Records Management Society’s toolkit for schools and this sets out how long we keep information about pupils.

Who we share pupil information with

We routinely share pupil information with:

schools that the pupils attend after leaving us
our local authority
the Department for Education (DfE)
OFSTED

suppliers and service providers – to enable them to provide the service we have contracted them for
financial organisations – such as Parentpay
central and local government
school nurse and health authority
NHS
health and social welfare organisations
police forces, courts, tribunals
professional adviser and consultants
charities and voluntary organisations
the high school your child will move on to
Stanah ASC and Breakfast Club

Why we regularly share pupil information

We do not share information about our pupils with anyone without consent unless the law and our policies allow us to do so.

We are required to share information about our pupils with our local authority (LA) and the Department for Education (DfE) under section 3 of The Education (Information About Individual Pupils) (England) Regulations 2013.

Department for Education (DfE)

The Department for Education (DfE) collects personal data from educational settings and local authorities via various statutory data collections. We are required to share information about our pupils with the Department for Education (DfE) either directly or via our local authority for the purpose of those data collections, under:

Data collection requirements:

To find out more about the data collection requirements placed on us by the Department for Education (for example; via the school census) go to https://www.gov.uk/education/data-collection-and-censuses-for-schools.

The National Pupil Database (NPD)

The NPD is owned and managed by the Department for Education and contains information about pupils in schools in England. It provides invaluable evidence on educational performance to inform independent research, as well as studies commissioned by the Department. It is held in electronic format for statistical purposes. This information is securely collected from a range of sources including schools, local authorities and awarding bodies.

We are required by law, to provide information about our pupils to the DfE as part of statutory data collections such as the school census and early years’ census. Some of this information is then stored in the NPD. The law that allows this is the Education (Information About Individual Pupils) (England) Regulations 2013.

To find out more about the NPD, go to https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/national-pupil-database-user-guide-and-supporting-information.

The department may share information about our pupils from the NPD with third parties who promote the education or well-being of children in England by:

conducting research or analysis
producing statistics
providing information, advice or guidance

The Department has robust processes in place to ensure the confidentiality of our data is maintained and there are stringent controls in place regarding access and use of the data. Decisions on whether DfE releases data to third parties are subject to a strict approval process and based on a detailed assessment of:

who is requesting the data
the purpose for which it is required
the level and sensitivity of data requested: and
the arrangements in place to store and handle the data

For more information about the department’s data sharing process, please visit: https://www.gov.uk/data-protection-how-we-collect-and-share-research-data

For information about which organisations the department has provided pupil information, (and for which project), please visit the following website: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/national-pupil-database-requests-received

To contact DfE: https://www.gov.uk/contact-dfe

Requesting access to your personal data

Under data protection legislation, parents and pupils have the right to request access to information about them that we hold. To make a request for your personal information, or be given access to your child’s educational record, contact Mrs R Legge via email bursar@stanah.lancs.sch.uk

You also have the right to:

to ask us for access to information about you that we hold
to have your personal data rectified, if it is inaccurate or incomplete
to request the deletion or removal of personal data where there is no compelling reason for its continued processing
to restrict our processing of your personal data (i.e. permitting its storage but no further processing)
to object to direct marketing (including profiling) and processing for the purposes of scientific/historical research and statistics
not to be subject to decisions based purely on automated processing where it produces a legal or similarly significant effect on you

If you have a concern or complaint about the way we are collecting or using your personal data, you should raise your concern with us in the first instance or directly to the Information Commissioner’s Office at https://ico.org.uk/concerns/