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College Notices

St Patrick’s College Privacy Program – Information Collection Notice (Students, Parents and Carers)

The College is committed to protecting the Privacy of all stakeholders including students, staff, parents and carers.  This Collection Notice outlines the manner in which we collect, use and disclose the personal information of students, parents and carers and it is publicly available on our College website. 

 

We have recently reviewed and updated this Collection Notice and you are welcome to contact the College Privacy Officer, Richie Chacon (Director of Business Services) at richie.chacon@spc.nsw.edu.au or on 9763 1000 if you have any queries.  

 

INFORMATION COLLECTION NOTICE  Students, Parents and Carers

“St Patrick’s College is part of Edmund Rice Education Australia (EREA), which is an organisation consisting of schools, entities and offices offering a Catholic education in the tradition of Blessed Edmund Rice.”

 

1. This Collection Notice explains in general terms how we protect the privacy of the personal information provided to the College by students, parents and carers. In reviewing this Collection Notice and providing us with your personal information, you consent to our collection, use and disclosure of that information in the manner set out below, unless you tell us otherwise. 

 

2. St Patrick’s College collects personal information, including sensitive information about students and parents or carers and family members before and during the course of a student's enrolment at the College. The primary purpose of collecting this information is to enable the College to meet its educational, administrative and duty of care responsibilities to the student to enable them to take part in all the activities of the College. 

 

3. Some of the information the College collects is to satisfy the College’s legal obligations, particularly to enable the College to discharge its duty of care.  Laws governing or relating to the operation of a College require certain information to be collected and disclosed. These include relevant Education Acts and Public Health and Child Protection laws. 

 

4. The College may request medical reports and health information about students from time to time to discharge its legal duty of care to the student and to other students and staff. This includes health or medical information which is reasonably likely to impact on the College’s ability to provide educational, first aid and related services.  If such information is withheld, the College may not be able to fully discharge its duty of care to students and staff.  We view this as an unacceptable risk and may not proceed with, or continue with, the enrolment of a student. 

 

5. Health information about students is sensitive information within the terms of the Australian Privacy Principles (APPs) under the Privacy Act 1988. A student’s health and medical information will be disseminated and used within the College to best meet the College’s duty of care responsibilities. This includes the use of health care plans with photographs to facilitate the identification of students who may be at heightened risk. 

 

Our College Counsellors will disclose information within the College regarding a student’s health, wellbeing or medical status where this will assist the student to receive appropriate educational and pastoral support including potential learning adjustments. The type and extent of the information shared will only be that which is necessary to ensure the College can meet its legal obligations and Duty of Care to the student and to enable the College to provide appropriate services that are relevant to the student’s needs.  

 

6. The College uses video camera surveillance for the purposes of providing safety and security within the College premises, protecting students and staff, preventing vandalism and assisting in the identification of criminal/anti-social behaviour. 

 

7. The College may disclose personal and sensitive information for administrative, educational and support purposes (or may permit the information to be directly collected by third parties). This may include to:

  • government departments
  • third party service providers that provide online educational and assessment support services or applications (apps), which may include email and instant messaging
  • another College or School to facilitate the transfer of a student
  • medical practitioners, and people providing educational support and health services to the College, including specialist visiting teachers, sports coaches, volunteers, counsellors and providers of learning and assessment tools
  • assessment and educational authorities, including the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority and the Nationally Consistent Collection of Data (NCCD) Scheme that requires information on the extent of adjustments made for students with disability.
  • people providing administrative and financial services to the College
  • anyone you authorise the College to disclose information to and
  • anyone to whom the College is required or authorised to disclose the information to by law, including under child protection laws.

8. On occasions information such as academic and sporting achievements, student activities, College events and similar news are published.  This information may be on physical display throughout the College and published in newsletters, magazines, on our website or via our College social media channels. This may include relevant descriptive information as well as photographs and videos of sporting events, College camps, performances, social dinners and excursions.

 

9. Material recording the College’s history and information about members of its community may be stored in the Archives of the College. Some of this information is also retained for statutory and legal purposes.

 

10. The College will engage in fundraising activities from time to time. Information received from you may be used for these purposes. It may also be disclosed to the College’s Parent and Friends Association who assist in the fundraising activities of the College. We will not disclose your personal information to third parties for their own marketing purposes without your consent.

 

11. The College may also use cloud computing service providers to store personal information (which may include sensitive information) on their servers in the 'cloud'. These servers may be located in or outside Australia. This may mean that personal information may be stored or processed outside Australia. EREA’s Privacy Policy contains further information about its use of cloud and other third-party service providers and any of their overseas locations.

 

12. The EREA Privacy Policy is accessible via the College website. The policy sets out how parents, carers or students may seek access to, and correction of, their personal information which the College has collected and holds. However, access may be refused in certain circumstances such as where access would have an unreasonable impact on the privacy of others, or may result in a breach of the College’s duty of care to the student, or where students have provided information in confidence. Any refusal will be notified in writing with reasons if appropriate.

 

13. The EREA Privacy Policy also sets out how parents, guardians, students and their family can make a complaint about a breach of the APPs and how the complaint will be handled.

 

If you provide the College with the personal information of others, such as other family members, doctors or emergency contacts, we encourage you to inform them that you are disclosing that information to the College.  We recommend you inform them as to why you are disclosing the information and inform them that they can request access to and correction of that information, if they wish.  We encourage you to refer them to the EREA Privacy Policy for further details about such requests and how the College otherwise handles personal information it collects and complaints it receives.

 

Richie Chacon

Director of Business Services and

St Patrick's College Privacy Officer