Privacy Notice – Children and School Workforce

The Local Authority (LA) uses information about children for whom it provides services, to enable it to carry out specific functions for which it is responsible, such as the assessment of any special educational needs the child may have. It also uses the information to derive statistics to inform decisions on (for example) the funding of schools, and to assess the performance of schools and set targets for them. The statistics are used in such a way that individual children cannot be identified from them.

The Local Authority will use information about its school workforce for research and statistical purposes, and to evaluate and develop education policy and strategies.  The statistics are used in such a way that individual staff cannot be indentified from them. The LA may also use it to support and monitor schools regarding sickness and recruitment of staff.

The Local Authority will use information about its school population to pass onto Tees Valley Unlimited for the production of ward and neighbourhood statistics and to produce pupil projections.  The statistics are used in such a way that individuals cannot be identified.

Primary Care Trusts (PCT) use information about pupils for research and statistical purposes, to monitor the performance of local health services and to evaluate and develop them. The statistics are used in such a way that individual pupils cannot be identified from them. Information on the height and weight of individual pupils may however be provided to the child and its parents and this will require the PCTs to maintain details of pupils' names for this purpose for a period designated by the Department of Health following the weighing and measuring process. PCTs may also provide individual schools and LAs with aggregate information on pupils' height and weight.

Information is also shared with the Tees Community Dental Service to enable them with the dental screening programme within schools.  Information is provided to them in order to gain consent from parents for any treatment that may be required.

Youth Support Services - For pupils aged 13 years and over, the school is legally required to pass on certain information to the provider of youth support services in their area. This is the local authority support service for young people aged 13 to 19 in England . The school must provide the name and address of the pupil and their parents and any further information relevant to the support services' role. In addition, the date of birth of the pupil is supplied.

Until pupils are aged 16 or older, their parent(s) can ask that no information beyond their children's name, address and date of birth (and their own name and address) be passed to the youth support services provider. This right transfers to the pupil on their 16th birthday. Pupils and/or parents will need to inform the school if this is what they wish.

Online information, advice and support on a range of issues affecting young people can be found on the Directgov Young People page at www.direct.gov.uk/en/YoungPeople/index.htm with access to trained helpline advisers, via SMS text message, telephone, webchat and email.