Dudley Careers Service Privacy Notice

The Education and Skills Act 2008, requires all young people in England to continue in education or training until at least their 18th birthday. 

Responsibility and accountability lies with local authorities to increase participation and reduce the proportion of young people who are NEET (not in education, employment or training).  Local authorities have a critical role to play in supporting young people to access education and training - and therefore in understanding the characteristics and current activity of the young people in their area.

Local authorities have broad duties to encourage, enable and assist young people to participate in education or training. Specifically these are:

• To secure sufficient suitable education and training provision for all young people in their area who are over compulsory school age but under 19 or aged 19 to 25 and for whom an Education, Health and Care (EHC) plan is maintained. This is a duty under the Education Act 1996 to fulfil this, local authorities need to have a strategic overview of the provision available in their area and to identify and resolve gaps in provision.
• To make available to all young people aged 13-19 and to those between 20 and 25 with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND), support that will encourage, enable or assist them to participate in education or training under Section 68 of Education and Skills Act 2008.

Tracking young people’s participation is a key element of these duties. Local authorities are required to collect information about young people so that those who are not participating or are NEET can be identified and given support to re-engage.

The legal basis under UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR) Article 6 (1) is:

• (c) processing is necessary for compliance with a legal obligation to which the controller is subject.

There is a legal requirement under the Education and Skills Act 2008 for schools to pass information on request to the youth support service for pupils in or approaching the age of 13. The information which schools are required to provide consists of:

1. the names and addresses of pupils and their parents - which must be provided to the youth support service in any event
2. the date of birth of the pupil
3. other information relevant to the provision of youth support services. Parents - or pupils themselves if aged 16 or over - have the right to instruct the school not to provide information (over and above name, address and date of birth) to the youth support service

The provision under (c) is for an opt-in. Until and unless the parent or pupil gives an instruction, the school remains under a statutory duty to provide only the data at a) and b) above.

Dudley Careers Service on behalf of Dudley MBC processes the information recorded on its Client Caseload Information System and submits information back to the Department for Education, for statutory returns covered by the Education and Skills Act 2008.

Section 72 of Education and Skills Act 2008 places a duty on educational institutions to provide information to local authority services in order for them to deliver their duties under section 68. Sections 76 and 77 provide additional data sharing powers to support local authorities to deliver their duties under section 68. Dudley Careers Service has data sharing agreements with education providers and other public bodies that set out the information they will provide, when it will be provided and how information will be passed securely.

Information that can be provided includes:

• Forename
• Middle Name
• Surname
• Gender
• Date of Birth
• Address and Postcode
• Mobile number*
• Telephone number*
• Email address*
• Ethnic background
• Disability status
• Unique Learner Number
• Expected course end date
• Academic Level of main course
• Main aim of attendance
• Course start date
• Main Course title
• Hours of attendance
• Last School Attended
• Whether studying as part of an Apprenticeship

* Contact details to be provided depending on whether the young person has refused consent upon enrolling.

Information will be passed back to schools within the Dudley borough where a young person has attended in order to comply with the schools tracking responsibility under the new Careers guidance.  This information will be limited to any education establishment former pupils are attending and their current status (e.g. Further Education, NEET in an Apprenticeship), but will not include any personal data such as addresses or contact numbers.

Information sent or received from any third parties will be sent securely over e-mail or designated secure portals that are access restricted and password protected. 

Dudley Careers Service will retain client information for five years after their 19th birthday or their 25th birthday where the client has an EHCP or is a Dudley Care Leaver.

The UK General Data Protection Regulations (UK GDPR) provides individuals with the following rights in relation to their personal information that the Dudley Careers Service holds:

You have the right to: (subject to some legal exceptions)

• request a copy of your information (known as a subject access request)
• request rectification or erasure of your information
• request a restriction on the processing of your information
• object to processing of your information, and
• complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office about the way Dudley Council processes your information

Where information is processed for the purposes of option (c) referred to above (what information we collect), the right to have information deleted/withdraw consent to processing applies.

Please note that the right of access under UK GDPR does not apply to Educational Healthcare Plans (EHCP).  Access to this information is processed under Regulation 17 of the Special Educational Needs and Disability Regulations 2014.  You should contact the SEN team (senteam@dudley.gov.uk) if you require access to this information.

If you require further information about the use of your data or would like to exercise any of the above rights, please contact the Data Protection Officer at:

Dudley Metropolitan Borough Council
The Council House, 
Priory Road, Dudley, 
DY1 1HF

or via email at information.governance@dudley.gov.uk