Data Protection & Learner Privacy

How We Use Your Personal Information

This privacy notice is issued by Halesowen College to inform learners how the College will use their personal information. For the purposes of the General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR) the College is the data controller for personal information processed by the College.

Your information is used by the College to exercise its functions and to meet its responsibilities, both statutory and otherwise for delivery of your study programme/course and associated activities.

Your information may be shared with third parties for funding, education, training, employment, debt collection, marketing, safeguarding/wellbeing purposes and research in as far as the law allows and the sharing is in compliance with the GDPR. Should you wish to abstain from your image/details being used in marketing materials you must contact the data protection controller at dp@halesowen.ac.uk.

Halesowen College will also share with the people you declare to be your emergency contacts on your learning agreement, information about your attendance at College, progress and results, behaviour and any other details relevant to your study programme/College experience, and/or any information that you have provided to the College.

You can opt out of contact for other purposes by ticking any of the boxes on your learning agreement.

Further information about use of and access to your personal data refer to theCollege Data Protection Policy.

ESFA Privacy Notice 2023 to 2024


Halesowen College is funded for your course by the Education Skills Funding Agency (ESFA). Both the College and the agency will use your personal data as described in the privacy notices below.

How We Use Your Personal Information

This privacy notice is issued by the Education and Skills Funding Agency (ESFA) on behalf of the Secretary of State for the Department of Education (DfE) to inform learners about the Individualised Learner Record (ILR) and how their personal information is used in the ILR. Your personal information is used by the DfE to exercise our functions under article 6(1)(e) of the UK GDPR and to meet our statutory responsibilities, including under the Apprenticeships, Skills, Children and Learning Act 2009. Our lawful basis for using your special category personal data is covered under Substantial Public Interest based in law (Article 9(2)(g)) of GDPR legislation. This processing is under Section 54 of the Further and Higher Education Act (1992).

The ILR collects data about learners and learning undertaken. Publicly funded colleges, training organisations, local authorities, and employers (FE providers) must collect and return the data to the ESFA each year under the terms of a funding agreement, contract or grant agreement. It helps ensure that public money distributed through the ESFA is being spent in line with government targets. It is also used for education, training, employment, and well-being purposes, including research.

We retain your ILR learner data for 20 years for operational purposes (e.g. to fund your learning and to publish official statistics). Your personal data is then retained in our research databases until you are aged 80 years so that it can be used for long-term research purposes. For more information about the ILR and the data collected, please see the ILR specification at https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/individualised-learner-record-ilr

ILR data is shared with third parties where it complies with DfE data sharing procedures and where the law allows it. The DfE and the English European Social Fund (ESF) Managing Authority (or agents acting on their behalf) may contact learners to carry out research and evaluation to inform the effectiveness of training.

For more information about how your personal data is used and your individual rights, please see the DfE Personal Information Charter (https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/department-for-education/about/personal-information-charter) and the DfE Privacy Notice (https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/privacy-notice-for-key-stage-5-and-adult-education)

If you would like to get in touch with us or request a copy of the personal information DfE holds about you, you can contact the DfE in the following ways:

If you are unhappy with how we have used your personal data, you can complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) at:
Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF. You can also call their helpline on 0303 123 1113 or visit https://www.ico.org.uk