NLAECL Privacy Policy

Adult Education & Community Learning Privacy Notice

Short Privacy Notice – Adult Education and Community Learning 

The North Lincolnshire Council Adult Education and Community Learning service collects and processes personal data to deliver accredited and non-accredited courses to adult learners aged 19 and over, on behalf of North Lincolnshire Council.
Personal data will be handled in accordance with the General Data Protection Regulation/ Data Protection Act 2018 and other relevant legislation, and we will not disclose your data to any other third party, unless allowed or required to do so by legislation.  For further details about the processing of your personal data please see the Full Privacy Notice and other information on our Data Protection and Privacy web page. North Lincolnshire Council | General Privacy Notice – North Lincolnshire Council (northlincs.gov.uk)

Full Privacy Notice – Adult Education and Community Learning (AECL)

Data Controller
AECL delivers accredited and non-accredited courses to adult learners aged 19 and over on behalf of North Lincolnshire Council.  The majority of AECL’s programmes are subsidised either wholly or in part by the Department for Education (DfE). This organisation requires AECL to collect personal data in order to compile funding claims, to monitor how the funding is being spent, and to gauge the effectiveness of AECL’s equality and diversity policy.

For such funded courses, the Department for Education (DfE) is the Data Controller.

For courses not funded by the DfE, AECL and therefore North Lincolnshire Council is the Data Controller.

Contact details

North Lincolnshire Council Adult Education and Community Learning (AECL):
Church Square House
30-40 High Street
Scunthorpe
North Lincolnshire
DN15 6NL
Email: customerservice@northlincs.gov.uk
Telephone: 01724 297000
Website: North Lincolnshire Adult Education & Community Learning – North Lincolnshire Adult Education and Community Learning

Purpose of this Privacy Notice

This Privacy Notice tells you about how North Lincolnshire Council is using personal data in relation to (AECL).

What do we mean by personal confidential data?

Personal data relates to living persons and is information that can be used to identify an individual such as name, date of birth, address or postcode.

What data do we have?

Personal data is being collected for reasons including:

• Service delivery
• Service improvement and planning
• Research
• Statistical analysis and reporting
• Safeguarding
• Information, advice & guidance
• Enrolment
• Delivery of learning/assessment
• Course administration
• Provision of educational references and communication directly related to learning programmes. 

Further information about the use of and access to your personal data, details of organisations with whom the DfE shares data, and how long they retain your data can be found online at Privacy information: key stage 4 and 5 and adult education – GOV.UK

The following personal data is collected:

• Contact details – name, address and email address
• Date of birth
• Family circumstances and contact details
• Employment status
• Eligibility for any benefits
• Annual salary
• Existing qualifications

Special Category Personal Data

The following special category personal data is collected:

• Ethnicity
• Nationality
• Information about disabilities or learning difficulties
• Criminal Offence data

What do we do with the data we have?

AECL will use individual learner data to ensure learners receive the most appropriate training and support, to determine the correct fee status and to administer the learning programme and communicate with learners regarding their learning programmes.  The data is also used to enable AECL to fulfil its statutory obligations which include ensuring learners are entitled to government subsidised learning and providing data to the DfE, the Local Authority and other Government agencies for statutory, research and statistical purposes.  The consequences of not providing the information requested may result in you not being eligible to receive funding and therefore not eligible to undertake a programme of funded learning with us.

The information you supply is used by the Learning Records Service (LRS). The LRS issues Unique Learner Numbers (ULNs) and creates Personal Learning records across England, Wales and Northern Ireland, and is operated by the Department for Education.  For more information about how your information is processed, and to access your Personal Learning Record, please refer to the LRS: privacy notice – GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

We will use the marketing information you give us to send you emails about adult education courses in your local area only if you have given explicit consent to do so.

Who do we share your data with?

We sometimes need to share your information with other organisations and awarding bodies.  We will only share your information when it is necessary and when the law allows us to do so, and we will only share the minimum information we need to.  We may need to share your information with: 

• The Department for Education, which provides the funding for our service.
• The Learning Records Service (LRS), which holds your Personal Learning Record (PLR).
• The following awarding organisations that provide accreditation: City and Guilds, NCFE, CACHE, Gateway
• The Probation Service when they work in partnership with council’s Adult Education and the Jobs Team with regards to referring their clients to our courses and for the offer of employment support.

How do we get your personal data and why do we have it?

AECL collects and stores information you give us directly from our enquiry form, paper Adult Education application form and online Adult Education application form and that you complete.  We also collect specific data related to any learning support and assistance you require while learning with us.

The lawful bases we are relying on to process personal data are:

1. Consent – Article 6(1)(a) – for sending you marketing information.
2. For the performance of a contract – Article 6(1)(b) – under contract with the DfE and North Lincolnshire Council to provide courses.
3. To comply with a legal obligation – Article 6(1)(c) – to fulfil statutory obligations.
4. To perform tasks carried out in the public interest – Article (6)(1)(e) – where the council has a duty or official authority to carry out the task.

The lawful basis we are relying on to process special category personal data are:

1. Substantial Public Interest – Article 9(2)(g) – for processing information about ethnicity and health matters.  For this condition there is also the need to satisfy one of the conditions set out in Part 2 of Schedule 1 of the Data Protection Act 2018.  In this instance conditions 1 and 8 are met – statutory purposes and equality of opportunity or treatment.

The lawful basis we are relying on to process criminal offence data are:

Article 10 and Schedule 1, Part 2 of the Data Protection Act 2018, paragraph 6 – statutory and government purposes, paragraph 10 – preventing or detecting unlawful acts and paragraph 4 – safeguarding children and individuals at risk.

Please note that we will not process your personal data for a purpose that is incompatible with the reason it was collected for unless this is allowed or required under Data Protection legislation.

Can I withdraw my consent?

Yes, where the personal data has been collected and processed on the basis of consent.

If you no longer want to receive marketing information about AECL courses in your local area, you can unsubscribe by emailing: nlacl.enquiries@northlincs.gov.uk and we will process your request within one calendar month.

We will not contact you again by email, phone or text message for marketing purposes unless you renew your prior consent.

How do we store your information and for how long?

Our employees have contractual obligations of confidentiality, enforceable through disciplinary procedures and receive appropriate training on confidentiality and other aspects of Information Governance.

We take organisational and technical measures to ensure the information we hold is secure – such as using secure locations, restricting access to authorised personnel and protecting personal and confidential information held electronically.  We only exchange personal confidential information using secure methods, such as encrypted email.

Your personal data is retained in accordance with national guidance and our legal obligations.  In this instance we will retain your personal data as follows:

• Your personal marketing preferences for up to 3 years after you enrol on an Adult Education course or after you have completed an Adult Education application form. This will be the case unless you ask us to delete your information from our records before that time.

• Non-accredited provision (formerly Community Learning (CL) – 6 years after the end of the financial year in which the academic year concludes or concluded.

• Accredited provision (formerly Adult Skills Budget (ASB)
  • 2007-2013: Until 31 December 2022
  • 2014-2019: Until 31 December 2030

• From 1 August 2019 onwards: 6 years after the end of the financial year in which the academic year concludes or concluded.

Your personal data may be anonymised and kept for a longer period for statistical purposes.

Your Data Protection Rights

Under Data Protection law, you have rights including:

• Your right of access – to ask us for copies of your personal information. 
• Your right to rectification – to ask us to rectify information you think is inaccurate.  You also have the right to ask us to complete information you think is incomplete. 
• Your right to erasure – to ask us to erase your personal information in certain circumstances. 
• Your right to restriction of processing – to ask us to restrict the processing of your information in certain circumstances. 
• Your right to object to processing – to object to the processing of your personal data in certain circumstances.
• Your right to data portability – to ask that we transfer the information you gave us to another organisation, or to you, in certain circumstances.

You are not required to pay any charge for exercising your rights.  If you make a request, we have one month to respond to you.
Please contact us at:customerservice@northlincs.gov.uk, Tel: 01724 297000 or North Lincolnshire Council, Church Square House, 30 – 40 High Street, Scunthorpe, DN15 6NL, if you wish to make a request.

How to Complain

The main point of contact at the council for Data Protection matters is our Data Protection Officer (DPO).  If you have any Data Protection concerns about the collection of personal data for COVID19 and wish to make a complaint please contact our DPO, as follows:

Phillipa Thornley
Email: informationgovernanceteam@northlincs.gov.uk
Telephone: 01724 296224
Post: North Lincolnshire Council, Church Square House, 30-40 High Street, Scunthorpe, DN15 6NL

If you remain unhappy, you can also complain to the ICO, as follows:
Website: Information Commissioner’s Office
Post: Information Commissioner’s Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF
Telephone: 0303 123 1113