Adult Community Learning Privacy Notice

We only collect information from learners where there is a mandated requirement, or we have identified a business need. Types of information we collect are:

• Personal information (such as name, address, date of birth, phone number)
• Characteristics (such as ethnicity, disability, employment status)
• Learning related (such as attendance, support needed to help you learn, exam/assessment results)
• Safeguarding (such as emergency contact details, photo consent, other personal details where a concern is raised)
• Comments, compliments and complaints (personal information in order for us to respond to your comments where needed)
• Medical information required for the safe management of your learning

Dudley Adult and Community Learning Team

Learner information is collected by ACL and used for the provision of learning to adults aged 19 and over.

Information is used to:

• Provide independent information, advice and guidance to learners
• Ensure eligibility for funding and report to our funders
• Monitor and report learner progress and achievement
• Monitor the quality of the adult learning service
• Enable the service to reach those furthest from learning and address inequalities in accessing learning. This is achieved through statistical analysis and service planning.

Some personal details may be taken from you when you enquire about a course or have an Information, Advice and Guidance session. This is done to enable us to contact you about learning opportunities within ACL and will be done with your consent.

We need to collect and process your information in order to meet the rules of our funders and ensure that you are eligible for funding. If you do not provide us with the information we need to prove your eligibility you will not be allowed to join the course.

When you complete an enrolment form, the funding body’s privacy notice will be on the form. Community Learning and Adult Skills courses are funded by West Midlands Combined Authority (WMCA) and the Education and Skills Funding Agency (ESFA). Both ESFA and WMCA report personal information in order to meet statutory responsibilities that are set out by the Apprenticeships, Skills, Children and Learning Act 2009. Employer Provider Apprenticeships are also reported through the ESFA for the same reasons.

• You have given consent
• You have entered an agreement with us

Within Dudley Council information may be shared with other Council departments where necessary to follow up a service request, complaint or to take other action requested by or agreed with you to support the development or improvement of Dudley Council services and activities.

External funders such as ESFA and WMCA and with examination boards in relation to exams that you have specifically entered for.
Information may also be shared with third parties where legal to do so. 

We will process information in a legitimate and lawful basis to facilitate and provide our services to learners. In doing so we may use Adobe Sign, an electronic system, to validate and ensure agreements are legally binding through an e-signature solution.
This requires some information to be collected and stored with our third party cloud-hosted supplier in a safe and secure manner.

For further information on Adobe Sign please view the Adobe Sign Privacy Policy

Your data is held securely on Dudley MBC premises and IT servers adhering to the council wide data protection rules. Our database (Yeti) is hosted on servers within the UK.

We will not sell or share your information to a third party. Where you have given consent, we will contact you regarding courses which may interest you. Your details will not be passed to other marketing companies.

The council takes the security of your data seriously. The council has internal policies and controls in place to try to ensure that your data is not lost, accidentally destroyed, misused or disclosed, and is not accessed except by its employees in the performance of their duties. These internal policies and controls are communicated to staff through our online e-policy and e-training system that includes; Data Protection, Information Security, Email and Internet Policy, Appropriate use of global emails and Document Retention. In addition, the organisation has technical network, server and file store security level controls and measures in place, with each system having the appropriate security profiles/Access levels distinctive to roles and responsibilities. The purpose of security roles are to ensure individuals employed by the council have access at the relevant level and this is regularly reviewed.

Where the organisation engages third parties to process personal data on its behalf, they do so on the basis of written instructions, are under a duty of confidentiality and are obliged to implement appropriate technical and organisational measures to ensure the security of data.

Personal details relating to your learning will be retained according to the appropriate funding body.

Completed ACL forms, sent through Adobe Sign, will have a document retention period set no longer than 2 days where completed agreements will not be available through Adobe Sign thereafter.
You will need to contact the Enrolment officer if you require a copy of the agreement although the recipient would have received an email copy of a completed ACL form as part of the process.

Your personal information relating to enrolments will be kept for 12 years, then securely destroyed.