SETANTA COLLEGE – STUDENT DATA PROTECTION NOTICE

1. INTRODUCTION

At Setanta College, we treat your privacy seriously. Any personal data (i.e. information that can be used to identify you as an individual) which you provide to the College will be treated with the highest standards of security and confidentiality, in accordance with Irish and European Data Protection legislation and the College’s Data Protection Policy. This notice explains how the College collects, uses and shares personal data relating to prospective, current and former students of Setanta College (“you”). It also explains your rights under data protection law in relation to our processing of your data.

2. WHO WE ARE

Throughout this Notice, “we”, “us”, “our” and “the College” refers to Setanta College.

3. HOW WE COLLECT YOUR PERSONAL DATA

The personal data that the College holds about you is generally collected directly from you but some information may also be received from third parties including:

  • Other third level institutions (e.g. where you are transferring from those bodies to Setanta College, where you are a visiting student, where you are applying for a postgraduate course or where you are participating in a joint programme (e.g. with Irish American College));
  • Health and other professional bodies;
  • Linked education providers;
  • Agents and recruiters.

4. HOW WE USE YOUR PERSONAL DATA

The College processes personal data relating to its students for administrative and other purposes necessary for the management and functioning of the College. Primarily, the College processes your personal data during the course of your application, admission and registration, for assessment/examinations, fee collection, IT administration and library administration, on your graduation and at the end of your studies for archival and alumni relations purposes (upon graduation, the Student Records & Examinations department will automatically transfer your student record to the College’s Development and Alumni department). This data may, in some cases, include “special categories of data” (as defined in the Data Protection Acts) where it is necessary for the College to collect and process such data.

The College also processes your personal data for the following purposes:

  • SMS text messaging system: The College operates an SMS text messaging system which gives certain College departments the option to communicate with students quickly and comprehensively. As a registered student, you will be automatically added to the list to receive texts regarding College related information. This may include, for example, notification of cancelled workshops, reminders relating to you logging into the online learning portal, details regarding your parchment fees, reminders about outstanding fees. If you do not wish to receive text alerts from us, you can opt out of this. Regardless of the foregoing, the College will send a text message in the event of an emergency.
  • Publication and acknowledgement of awards: Unless you ask us not to, students and graduates’ names and awards are publicly acknowledged at College ceremonies and published in conferring booklets and other College publications.
  • To administer the awarding of scholarships and prizes.
  • To support discounted course fees.
  • Photographs/video recordings of College events: The College may take photographs and video recordings of College events such as conferring ceremonies. Such images/recordings may include individual or group shots which may be published or included in video/broadcasts on the College’s website. The College will seek to give advance notice of this whenever possible by, for example, making announcements, placing visible notices in the relevant area or advertising on College notice boards so that those who do not want to participate can avoid being recorded and avoid the area(s) if they wish. In addition, where the College wishes to process images featuring students for promotional purposes, the consent of the students involved will be sought in advance.
  • Workshop capture system: The College operates a workshop capture system which enables tutors/videographers to record video, audio and presentation material from their workshops as well as audio of questions from students/attendees. The College will seek to give workshop attendees advance notice of any such recording by placing visible notices in the relevant areas and making oral announcements at the start of the lecture.
  • To manage insurance/personal accident claims;
  • To ensure that the digital services provided by the College are performant, reliable, secure and to support appropriate IT incident resolution;
  • The administration of examination appeals and the mitigation process;
  • To administer appeals, complaints, grievances, disciplinary matters and matters relating to conduct and suspected breach of examination regulations/plagiarism;
  • To communicate with you where necessary and to provide communications about College news and events;
  • To provide wellbeing and support services, including disability support services (where you choose to access disability services, your consent will be sought before we process personal data relating to your disability);
  • To meet health and safety obligations;

5. OUR LEGAL BASIS FOR USING YOUR PERSONAL DATA

Under data protection law, we are required to ensure that there is an appropriate legal basis for the processing of your personal data, and to let you know what that basis is.

We process your personal data for the purposes outlined in this notice in pursuit of our legitimate interests in managing the College and providing you with the education and support services required during the course of your studies.

Whilst we rely on legitimate interest as the legal basis for processing where this is not overridden by the interests and rights or freedoms of the data subjects concerned, we recognise that it is not the only lawful ground for processing data. As such, where appropriate, we will sometimes process your data on an alternative legal basis – for example, because you have given us consent to do so.

6. PERSONAL DATA PROVIDED BY YOU ABOUT OTHERS

You may provide us with personal data about other individuals, for example, next of kin/emergency contact details and information about your family circumstances and dependents. You should notify the relevant person that you are providing their contact details to us.

7. WHO WE SHARE YOUR PERSONAL DATA WITH

In addition to cases where the College is required or permitted by law to disclose your personal data to others, the College may disclose your personal data in connection with the purposes referred to above. These include, but are not limited to:

  • Quality Qualifications Ireland
  • Higher Education Colleges Association
  • Funding bodies, research sponsors, industry funders and other agencies that support, sponsor or otherwise have a valid interest in your education
  • The Higher Education Authority (HEA) (see the HEA’s Student Data Collection Notice http://hea.ie/about-us/data_protection/)
  • Distance Education Accrediting Commission (DEAC)
  • Register of Exercise Professionals Ireland (REPs Ireland)
  • National Forum for teaching and learning
  • Providers of academic and other services to the College(who are obliged to keep your data safe and secure), which may also include, but is not limited to, wholly/majority owned subsidiaries of the College
  • Examination Boards and External Examiners
  • Government departments where required (e.g. Department of Education and Skills, Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection, Revenue)
  • Potential employers (where you have requested us to provide a reference)
  • The College’s insurance brokers and providers where required for administering claims
  • Professional and regulatory bodies where programmes are accredited by such bodies
  • External auditors
  • Other higher education institutions, partners or research organisations to or from which a student transfers or pursues an exchange programme or where a student’s programme is being run collaboratively

Where we use third parties to process personal data on our behalf (acting as data processors), a written contract will be put in place to ensure that any personal data shared will be held in accordance with the requirements of data protection law and that such data processors have appropriate security measures in place in relation to your personal data.

The College sometimes needs to communicate and share personal data worldwide in the course of its business and transfers personal data to countries outside the European Economic area. The College
will only do so on the understanding that we rely on legally approved mechanisms to lawfully transfer data across borders, including the Standard Contractual Clauses approved by the European Commission.

The College may share your personal data between different internal departments for operational reasons where necessary and proportionate for the purposes intended. Some of the personal data that the College holds, such as health details, is known as ‘special category data’ or ‘sensitive personal data’. In addition to the normal standards of confidentiality, we carefully control access to sensitive personal data within the College so that it is only available to those staff who require it to perform their duties.

8. HOW LONG WE WILL KEEP YOUR DATA

In keeping with the data protection principles we will only store your data for as long as is necessary. For the purposes described here we will store your data in accordance with the College’s Record Retention Schedules.

9. KEEPING YOUR DATA UP-TO-DATE

The Data Protection Acts require that personal data about individuals is accurate and kept up-to-date. It is important therefore that you update your personal details regularly (e.g. your postal address, mobile phone number). You can update your details by contacting the Student Records and Examinations Office by emailing ksmith@setantacollege.com

10. YOUR RIGHTS

You have various rights under data protection law, subject to certain exemptions, in connection with our processing of your personal data, including the right:

  • to find out if we use your personal data, to access your personal data and to receive copies of your personal data;
  • to have inaccurate/incomplete information corrected and updated;
  • in certain circumstances, to have your details deleted from systems that we use to process your personal data or have the use of your personal data restricted in certain ways;
  • to object to certain processing of your data by Setanta College;
  • to exercise your right to data portability where applicable (i.e. obtain a copy of your personal data in a commonly used electronic form);
  • where we have relied upon consent as a lawful basis for processing, to withdraw your consent to the processing at any time;
  • to not be subject to solely automated decision;
  • to request that we stop sending you direct marketing communications.

If you wish to avail of any of these rights, please write to Thomas Callanan, College Registrar, Setanta College, Thurles Chamber Enterprise Centre, Nenagh Road, Thurles, Co. Tipperary or by email to admin@setantacollege.com.

11. QUESTIONS OR COMPLAINTS

If you have any queries or complaints in connection with our processing of your personal data, you can contact Thomas Callanan, College Registrar, Setanta College, Thurles Chamber Enterprise Centre, Nenagh Road, Thurles, Co. Tipperary or by email to admin@setantacollege.com.

You also have the right to lodge a complaint with the Data Protection Commission if you are unhappy with our processing of your personal data. Details of how to lodge a complaint can be found on the Data Protection Commission’s website (www.dataprotection.ie), or by telephoning 1890 252 231.

12. REVISIONS TO THIS NOTICE

Please note the College may revise this data protection notice from time to time. Any changes will be posted on the main college website https://www.setantacollege.com/ so you should periodically check this website to review the most recent notice.

Version 1.0 (Last revised: 24/05/2019)