Fair processing notices - Employment, learning and skills

Employment, learning and skills take your privacy seriously and will only keep and use your personal information for reasons the law requires or allows.

In order to access Government funding, and enrol you onto a course, we require specific details about you, which will be held in our electronic enrolment system and reported to our funders the Education and Skills Funding Agency (ESFA). 

This privacy notice tells you:

• why we collect personal information about you
• what information we ask for
• how we use your personal information
• who we share your information with
• how long we keep your information
• who to contact if you have questions

We collect information from our learners to allow us to deliver adult and community learning courses, 16 to 19 study programmes/traineeships and apprenticeships. We need this information to deliver our programmes to you and for the Department for Education (DFE), and our funders the Education and Skills Funding Agency (ESFA), so they can check that we deliver the training to the required standard and to provide us with the funding. We collect the information required by the Education and Skills Funding Agency in order to secure public funding and European Social Fund (ESF) match funding for our training provision.

All the information we collect from you helps us to: 

• ensure you are eligible for funding for your course
• see who is attending our courses and, if necessary, change future courses to widen participation
• provide opportunities to learners who may otherwise not have access to learning
• improve the quality of our courses in the future
• meet the funding requirements of the Education and Skills Funding Agency (ESFA) which funds our learning

More details about the use of your personal information by the ESFA

The information we ask for will include: 

• your name, age and date of birth
• your contact details including address, email address and telephone numbers
• National Insurance Number
• your ethnicity or national origin
• emergency contact or next of kin details
• prior educational achievements
• employment history
• health information
• support needs
• household situation
• other information relevant to learner surveys 
• information about attendance, progression and destination at course end and any sickness absence

All personal data held is processed in accordance with data protection law. The data controller for the processing outlined in this privacy notice is Stoke-on-Trent City Council. We keep this information secure in our IT systems. Some information may also be held securely in paper files, such as an enrolment form or register. 

We are allowed to process your information in these ways because we are carrying out our public task.  

Your ethnicity and health data is collected by us when you complete an enrolment form, however we are acting as a data processor to the funding body with regard to this data and simply pass on the data that you provide on your form. Ofsted and the DfE also use this data for monitoring purposes in statistical form.

To ensure the correct learners are accessing our funding we also ask questions about how you found out about the learning opportunity, and what you hope to gain from attending the course. 

We will only ask for information that is necessary, and we will never collect any information that is not used by our service or the funding bodies. 

We will ensure your privacy is protected and that your information is safe. In order to stop unauthorised access or sharing we have put in place physical and electronic procedures to safeguard and secure the information we collect from you.

Processing your personal information is necessary for us to claim funding when you enrol onto a training course or apprenticeship programme with Learn 4 Work or adult and community learning. It also helps us to ensure we can put in place any support measures to help you with your training.

You can change your mind at any time, or withdraw your personal information. this can be done by speaking to a member of staff but again this may affect you continuing with your training.

To receive funding, we must undertake eligibility checks, which include accessing your personal learning record via the Learning Records Service (LRS) to verify your qualifications and grades and provide evidence of eligibility for a training programme. More information about your personal learning record and who can access it can be found in the LRS privacy notice. The information you supply is used by the LRS. The LRS issues Unique Learner Numbers (ULN) and creates personal learning records across England, Wales and Northern Ireland, and is operated by the Education and Skills Funding Agency, an executive agency of the Department for Education (DfE).

Learning Records Service website

Sometimes our funders or Ofsted may contact you directly to talk to you about your learning with us or ask what has happened since finishing your learning programme, for example whether you have a job or are undertaking further training.

We will use the information collected from you to enable enrolment and participation through to completion in our training and apprenticeship programmes and secure funding for your programme. We will also use your information for internal reporting purposes to improve our training offer.

We will need to share some of your information with other people and organisations. This may include your personal contact details, your attendance and progression in training, your achievements, or employment progress. The people we regularly share this information with are:

• Ofsted (the regulatory body for training and education)
• Department for Education (DfE)
• employers (potential and current)
• Education and Skills Funding Agency
• awarding bodies who award your certificates
• parents and guardians
• tutors and trainers 
• sub-contracted training providers
• employment, learning and skills staff 

There may be occasions when we are legally required or allowed to share information with statutory agencies such as the police, local authorities, courts or HMRC. This may be in relation to educational statistics, safeguarding risks, criminal or civil proceedings or fraud. Information can be shared without your consent in these circumstances.

We will not share your information with third parties unless requested. For example, we may be required to share details of your attendance and participation with your referrer (this may be a Job Centre or other agency who has referred you to us), with your employer, with your parents or guardian. By agreeing to us processing your information on the enrolment form, you are agreeing to this information being shared.

We do not share your information with bodies outside of the EU.

We will only keep your information for the minimum period necessary. All information will be held securely and destroyed under confidential conditions. 

The personal data and details of your learning programmes and any financial documents related to funding of your programme must be retained by us for the period set by the funding body the ESFA. The current requirement is that we hold your data until 2030. 

You have rights under the law including the right to see the information we hold, to ask us for a copy of it, to have it changed if it is not correct or out of date, or request to have it deleted. 

There will be times when we cannot delete all of your information because our funders require us to keep certain parts of your learning records for audit purposes.

If you have any questions or concerns about the collection, use or disclosure of your personal information contact: 
Employment, learning and skills, learning services, children and family services, One Smithfield, Leonard Coates Way, Hanley, Stoke-on-Trent, ST1 4FA

If you wish to contact us in relation to any of your information rights, contact the information rights team at foi@stoke.gov.uk or Information rights team, Floor 2, Civic Centre, Glebe Street, Stoke-on-Trent ST4 1HH

Online feedback form

If you are not satisfied you can complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF, or call 0303 123 1113.