This privacy notice explains:
- how personal information is going to be used
- what it is used for
- who it might be shared with and why
- how long it is kept.
The information you provide helps us deliver our services effectively.
Personal and special category data
The types of personal data we hold may include:
- unique pupil number
- contact details
- parent/carer details
- National Insurance/National Asylum Seeker Service number
- date of birth
- attendance information
- ethnicity
- personal characteristics relating to family health and environment
- special educational needs and disabilities, including developmental progress
Data Controller
West Sussex County Council (WSCC) complies with the UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR) and the Data Protection Act 2018. It is registered as a ‘Data Controller’ with the Information Commissioner’s Office (Reg. No. Z6413427).
You can find details for the WSCC Data Protection Officer (DPO) on our Privacy Policy.
We ensure that your personal data is accurate, processed fairly and lawfully, kept secure and retained for no longer than is necessary.
The legal basis for processing personal data
We collect and use your personal information so that we can meet our legal duties and carry out tasks that are in the public interest.
We rely on lawful bases under the UK GDPR which are:
- legal obligation - we need to process your information because the law requires us to
- public task - we need to process your information to carry out our official duties as a local authority
If we need to use special category personal data (for example, information about health or other sensitive details), we rely on substantial public interest which includes processing your information to support equality of opportunity or treatment, as set out in the Data Protection Act 2018.
When we collect or share special category personal data, we rely upon the legal bases under UK GDPR, which is Article 9(2)(g) - Reasons of substantial public interest. We rely on the ‘equality of opportunity or treatment’ purpose condition from Schedule 1 of the Data Protection Act 2018 when relying on Article 9(2)(g) to process your special category data.
How we use your personal information
Our Privacy Policy determines how we use personal data. We use it specifically to:
- support a child's development
- monitor a child's progress
- apply for funding
- provide appropriate pastoral care
- self-evaluate care provision for the purposes of Ofsted inspections
For example, we may use your information to:
- claim Early Years Funded Entitlement (EYFE) for children aged between 9 months and statutory school age including Early Years Pupil Premium (EYPP) and Disability Access Fund (DAF)
- identify the needs of children through Integrated Health Checks
- identify the needs of children and families through children’s learning and wellbeing audits
- safeguard children
- provide inclusion support
- inform multi professional SEND under 5 meetings
- support effective transitions
- ensure public funds are administered and spent in line with any statutory guidance or code of practice
- produce statistics which inform various decisions without identifying individual children
Who we share your information with
From time to time, early years and childcare settings are required to pass on some of this data to:
- local authorities
- the Department for Education (DfE)
- agencies that are prescribed by law
- Ofsted
We only share your personal and special category data when we have a lawful basis to do so under data protection law. This may include situations where we must share information to carry out our legal duties or public functions. We will only ask for your consent when it is optional and appropriate, and you can withdraw your consent at any time.
In particular, at age 5, an assessment (known as Early Years Foundation Stage Profile) is made of all children. This information is passed to the local authority and receiving schools to help meet the child’s needs. Any such organisation will have their own privacy notice.
Ofsted do not routinely process any information about individual children and hold no records of individual children’s progress. However, it does use information about the achievement of groups of children to help inform its judgements about the quality of education in early years providers.
See our Privacy Policy if you require more information about how we use this data.
How long we keep your personal data
Personal data will not be retained for longer than is necessary in relation to the purposes for which they are collected.
The council is currently reviewing and updating its retention policies. See our records management page for published retention schedules.
Your rights
See our Privacy Policy for more information on your rights.
Children, as data subjects, have certain rights under the GDPR 2018, including a general right of access to personal data held about them, with parents exercising this right on their behalf if they are too young to do so themselves.
Complaints
See our Privacy Policy for information about making a complaint.