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Privacy notice for the Governor Support Service

Introduction

This privacy notice explains what types of personal data we may hold about you, how we collect it, how we use and who we may share information with. We are required to give you this information under data protection law.

Who we are

Achieving for Children is a community interest company created in 2014 by the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames and London Borough of Richmond to provide children’s services. In August 2017 the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead became co-owner of Achieving for Children.

Achieving for Children delivers children’s services and the local authority statutory responsibilities relating to children aged up to 25 years across the boroughs of Kingston, Richmond and Windsor and Maidenhead. Achieving for Children is registered as a controller with the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), registration number ZA045069, and is committed to being transparent about how it collects and uses that data and to meeting its data protection obligations.

Governor Support provides a complete support, advice and comprehensive continuing professional development (CPD) service for governors, trustees, associate members and clerks from all school settings.

We provide relevant and timely guidance, advice and tools to empower governors, trustees, associate members and clerks to fulfil their duties effectively.

Our approach is to work with boards to review and challenge current practice, identify and implement solutions that best suit their needs to improve the effectiveness of leadership and management and promote school improvement.

Statutory duties of the service includes the following, where applicable:

  • supporting the recruitment and nomination process of local authority governors
  • assisting with constitutional changes and raising Instruments of Government (IOGs)
  • administering the appointment process of parent governor representatives on local authority forums
  • appointing additional governors or interim executive board members
  • providing information and signposting to governance training opportunities

Personal data we collect

If you are a governor, trustee, member, associate member or Clerk, we collect only the necessary personal data required when you provide it to us in the course of supporting you and fulfilling our statutory obligations. The personal data we collect includes:

  • Full name
  • Email address
  • Telephone number
  • Name of Governing Board
  • Date of appointment, term of office and appointing body (in accordance with the Governing Board’s Instrument of Government/Articles of Association)
  • Role on the Governing Board

How we use your personal data

We hold and store the personal data you provide securely and use it to:

  • contact governors, trustee, associate members, members and clerks to the Governing Boards during the academic cycle to assist in fulfilling their roles and responsibilities;
  • coordinate training and development opportunities which may be delivered face to face at one of our training venues or virtually through a variety of web conferencing platforms;
  • give access to e-Learning via Achieving for Children’s Workforce Development ME learning platform or an accredited trainer’s platform;
  • analyse course attendance to inform AfC internal and school level training reports
  • fulfill our statutory duties as appropriate

Lawful basis for processing your personal data

We collect and use the information ensuring that we comply with the UK General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and Data Protection Act 2018 requirements for processing through:

  • Article 6(1)(b) – processing is necessary for a contract we have with you
  • Article 6(1)(c) – processing is necessary for comply with a legal obligation
  • Article 6(1)(e) – processing is necessary to perform a task in the public interest or for our official functions, and the task or function has a clear basis in law

These articles under the GDPR and the DPA2018 are supported by the following specific legislation:

  • 2012 No. 1034 EDUCATION, ENGLAND The School Governance (Constitution) (England) Regulations 2012
  • The Parent Governor Representatives (England) Regulations 2001
  • The School Governance (Roles, Procedures and Allowances) (England) Regulations 2013
  • The School Governance (Constitution) (England) Regulations 2012
  • The School Governance (Federations) (England) Regulations 2012
  • Education and Adoption Act 2016 (which amends the Education and Inspections Act 2006 and the Academies Act 2010)
  • Education Act 2011 (which amended the 2006 Act and also the Academies Act 2010 in respect of land transfers to academies. Schedule 14 applies)
  • Academies Act 2010
  • Apprenticeships, Skills, Children and Learning Act 2009 (amended the 2006 Act) – makes provision for apprenticeships, education, training and children’s services
  • Education and Inspections Act 2006
  • Education Act 2002 Schedule 2 Effect on Staffing on suspension of delegated budget
  • School Governance (Transition from an Interim Executive Board) (England) Regulations 2010
  • School Governance (Role, Procedures and Allowances) (England) Regulations 2013 – associated departmental guidance can be found on the DfE website
  • School Standards and Framework Act 1998 – contains provisions for schools and nursery education. This covers further education for young people at school, and in FE institutions across the UK
  • Education and skills Acts 2008
  • Company Directors Disqualification Act 1986

Who we share your personal information with

We will only share information where it is appropriate and legal to do so. Where this is necessary, we are required to comply with all aspects of the Data Protection Act 2018.
We share your personal information with the school(s) where you are a governor. We may at times share anonymised information with our Commissioning Councils.

How long will we keep your information

We only keep your personal data for as long as is required by law and in accordance with our retention schedule.

Keeping your personal information secure

We have appropriate security measures in place to prevent personal information from being accidentally lost or used or accessed in an unauthorised way. We limit access to your personal information to those who have a genuine business need to know it. Those processing your information will do so only in an authorised manner and are subject to a duty of confidentiality.

Achieving for Children’s email service has been configured to Government Digital Service and we encrypt and authenticate email in transit using Transport Layer Security (TLS) and Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting and Conformance (DMARC). We will ensure that when we send emails containing your personal information they are sent using appropriate security measures to encrypt the data in transit. This may involve the use of a third party encryption tool where appropriate.

We also have procedures in place to deal with any suspected data security breach. We will notify you and any applicable regulator of a suspected data security breach where we are legally required to do so.

Your rights and access to information

Under data protection legislation you have the right to request access to the information that we hold about you. To request a copy of your data, please read the Individual Rights Requests page and then submit your request using your preferred method of contact.

You also have the right to:

  • object to processing of personal data that is likely to cause, or is causing, damage or distress
  • have inaccurate personal data rectified, blocked, erased or destroyed
  • prevent processing for the purpose of direct marketing object to decisions being taken by automated means
  • in certain circumstances have inaccurate personal data rectified, blocked, erased or destroyed; and
  • a right to seek redress, either through the ICO, or through the courts

If you have any questions or concerns about the way we process personal data, or would like to discuss anything in this privacy notice, please contact our Data Protection Officer: [email protected]

If you want to make a complaint about how we handle your personal data, we ask that you give our Data Protection Officer the opportunity to respond in the first instance but you are not obliged to do this. You can make a complaint directly to the Information Commissioner’s Office.

 

Version AfC/GS/PN v.1.0
Issue date: 09/12/2020