The Council will not keep your information for longer than is necessary. In some instances the law sets the length of time information has to be kept. The Council has a retention schedule which sets out how long we hold different types of information. This can be found here.
Below is further information regarding our privacy policies, statutory requirements and your rights.
This Privacy Notice explains how we use the information that we collect about you.
Fife Council uses the information provided by you to support your child during the course of his/her nursery and school career. The information will be used to communicate with parents/carers and children for the purposes of progress monitoring, supporting learning, career guidance, parent council elections, in emergency situations and to pass on other relevant advice.
Under the terms of the Education (Scotland) Act 1980 it is the duty of a parent of every child of school age to provide efficient education for him/her suitable to his/her age, ability and aptitude. The Education (Scotland) Act 1980 placed responsibility for the day to day delivery of public sector education in the hands of local authorities.
In addition, the Standards in Scotland's Schools etc. Act 2000 imposes a number of duties on local authorities, including a duty to provide education which is "directed to the development of the personality, talent and mental and physical abilities of the child or young person to their fullest potential".
Education authorities have wide ranging statutory responsibilities which extend across all sectors of the community from pre-school education to lifelong learning. Guidance on these statutory powers is provided in the Local Government etc Scotland Act 1994: Local Government Re-organisation: Guidance on Education Provisions.
The personal information we gather and use includes child's name, address, parent/carer and emergency contact details, date of birth and ethnicity.
We also require information on any medical condition, including dietary requirements relating to children during their nursery and school career.
Information may be shared with other Council Services and/or other external organisations, including suppliers of systems for recording and monitoring educational progress, attainment and achievement.
For example, information may be shared with Police Scotland, where it is necessary for the prevention/detection of crime/fraud; to protect vital interests or where required to do so to ensure compliance with a legal obligation/to fulfil statutory functions.
At the end of compulsory education, when young people are thinking about leaving school, the information may also be shared to support transition to further learning and training establishments such as college or university, and with organisations which support these transitions. The information may therefore be shared with other Council Services and third party organisation such as UCAS (Universities & Colleges Admissions Service), Skills Development Scotland (Careers) and further education establishments.
It is a legal obligation under the National Health Service (Scotland) Act 1978, for the NHS in Scotland to undertake programmes of health screening for all children of school age. This includes, for example, immunisations, dental inspections and routine health screening. Fife Council is also under a legal obligation in terms of this legislation to co-operate with the NHS, to secure and advance the health of the people of Scotland.
To enable the NHS to undertake these programmes and ensure the Council's compliance with the legislation, Fife Council will provide NHS Fife with basic child identifiable data for all children of school age in Fife. The basic data includes: your child's name; date of birth; home address; school attended and class.
The information will be securely transferred to NHS Fife and will be used to ensure children and young people receive the correct health screening care. The NHS uses the highest levels of security (in compliance with Data Protection Legislation) when handling your child's health information and will ensure that it is stored securely and is used in accordance with the NHS Privacy Notice, 'How the NHS handles your personal health information'.
The Privacy Notice is available on the NHS Fife and NHSInform websites or from Fife UHB.DataProtection@nhs.net.
Should you not wish your child to participate in the health surveillance programmes you will have the opportunity to opt out of all, or part of these programmes. To opt out of these programmes you should write to NHS Fife. You will be notified of the appropriate time to do this. For further information on the screening programme please contact NHS Fife Business Manager - Children's Services, telephone number 01383 565320.
We gather information about you and other individuals through the data capture processes in schools. It is therefore important that other individuals you tell us about e.g. emergency contacts are aware that you have disclosed information to us.
We receive information about you from other local authorities, NHS Boards and the Health and Social Care Partnership.
We also receive information from Police Scotland regarding concerns about child welfare and wellbeing. Police Scotland will make you aware of this if they have attended an incident involving a child or young person for whom they have a concern.
In the event that we did not request and use this information then it would not be possible to carry out our statutory functions and support your child during the course of his/her Education.
Parents/Carers have the right to access their child’s educational records under the terms of The Pupils’ Educational Records (Scotland) Regulations 2003.
Definition of Parent
‘Parent’ is widely defined and includes carer, any person liable to maintain the child or young person, or who has care of the child or young person etc. This means that the unmarried father, who does not have automatic parental rights in relation to the child’s or young person’s welfare, does have rights in relation to the child’s or young person’s education and this includes the right to make a request to access the child’s or young person’s Educational Records.
Definition of an Educational Record
An educational record means any record of information, excluding information contained in a Co-ordinated Support Plan, which:
• are processed by or on behalf of the authority;
• relate to any person who is or has been a pupil at the school;
• relate to the school education of that person; and
• originated from or supplied by a teacher; any other employee of the responsible body, the child or young person to whom the information relates; or a parent/carer of that child or young person
Further information on how your information is used and why can be found at fifedirect.org.uk/privacy. The Council’s Data Protection Officer can be contacted at: dataprotection@fife.gov.uk.