Privacy notice: Students

Goldsmiths is committed to protecting any personal information provided to us and meeting our legal duties under the Data Protection Act 2018, the General Data Protection Regulation and any other applicable laws.

This notice explains how Goldsmiths will collect, use and share your personal data and sets out your rights in relation to your personal data Goldsmiths holds.

It should be read alongside our general privacy information and other privacy notices.

Where your personal data is collected from

Your personal data is collected from the following sources:

• You – you provide data when you express an interest in studying at Goldsmiths, upon application to study, when registering as a student at the College, through using various College services while you undertake your studies, when registering for events or volunteering opportunities, when making a donation, when registering an interest in or joining the alumni community, when registering an interest in or using alumni services such as the library and Goldsmiths Connect, and through assessments or consultations
• Third parties – the College obtains data from various organisations such as UCAS, the Student Loans Company and other academic institutions

The personal data that is collected and processed

The data collected and processed may include: 

• Your name, title, gender, date of birth, passport number, country of domicile and nationality
• Contact details (address, email addresses, phone numbers)
• Information relating to your previous education, such as subjects studied and examination outcomes
• Any employment history, including employers and employment period
• Funding and financial information collected for the purposes of administering fees and charges, loans, grants, scholarships and hardship funds
• Records of attendance at Goldsmiths
• Records of assessment outcomes, including details of summative assessments submitted, examinations taken, marks and grades awarded, academic appeals, student complaints and disciplinary procedures
• Records generated through your use of College services, such as Student Accommodation and Wellbeing
• Your views on matters relating to the operation of the College
• Sensitive personal data or special category data, including your racial or ethnic origin, religious beliefs or other beliefs, physical or mental health conditions and particular criminal convictions. Goldsmiths may also process biometric data to verify your identity, when required by law

The purpose of processing your personal data

Goldsmiths will process your personal data for the following purposes:

• The administration and delivery of your academic studies (for example, timetabling)
• To administrate and deliver all College services that you are eligible for (for example IT and Library Services)
• To verify your eligibility for financial awards such as prizes, scholarships and bursaries, and to grant and administer such awards
• To administer the careers services offered to you and provide details of support, mentoring, job opportunities and events available within and outside the College 
• To maintain the good order of the College and for security and crime prevention
• Compliance with legal and regulatory responsibilities (for example UK Visas and Immigration)
• To maintain and strengthen the alumni community
• To enhance College activities or develop new ones
• To ensure the effectiveness of College operations
• To conduct equal opportunities monitoring

Securing your personal data

Your personal data is held securely within the College. Access to the data is controlled. Staff processing the data receive relevant training on data protection and information security.

From time to time, the College may commission agents of a third party to enhance the systems storing your personal data.

Where this occurs they will act strictly in accordance with the instructions given by the College, scheduled within a data sharing agreement, so that your personal data remains secure.

Sharing your personal data with others

It is occasionally necessary for Goldsmiths to share your personal data with third parties. It may necessary share your personal data as follows:

• The local authority – to enable the assessment and collection of Council Tax and the administration of the electoral register
• All statutory authorities with duties relating to the prevention and detection of crime, the apprehension and prosecution of offenders, collection of tax or duty, or safeguarding national security – to assist authorities in the execution of their duties having had due regard to your rights and freedoms and the necessity of infringing them
• UK Visas and Immigration – to fulfil the terms of the College’s sponsor licence
• The Office for Students or Designated Data Body (HESA)– to comply with the College’s statutory and regulatory duties
• The Student Loans Company or any other statutory funding or sponsorship organisation with whom the College has a contractual relationship – to manage receipt of tuition fees
• Goldsmiths Students’ Union – to facilitate student membership of the Union and partnership projects where appropriate
• The University of London – to ensure you have access to University facilities and for the award of University degrees
• Professional bodies – to confirm qualifications and accreditation for practice in a profession
• Placement providers – to facilitate any placement that may be a part of a programme of study
• Potential employers or educational providers whom you have approached - to verify of details of your qualifications
• Any donors or third party organisations funding scholarships and other financial awards, including where these are part of panels that will make a decision on applications for such awards
• Other third parties to enhance or develop the College’s academic activities

HESA and the Graduate Outcome Survey

The Higher Education Statistics Agency Limited (HESA) is the body responsible for collecting and disseminating information about higher education in the UK and the Designated Data Body for England.

HESA is a Controller of your information.HESA’s wholly-owned subsidiary company HESA Services Limited acts as a Processor to do work on behalf of HESA and other organisations described in the notice below but may also act as a Controller.

All of the HESA collection notices are available on the HESA website, including the Student Collection Notice. These relate to information about you which will be collected by Goldsmiths and passed to HESA and other organisations as described.

In particular, Goldsmiths submits student data to HESA as set out in the student collection notice.

The Graduate Outcomes survey is the biggest annual social survey in the UK and captures the perspectives and current status of graduates.

All graduates who completed a higher education course in the UK after August 2017 will be asked to take part in the survey 15 months after they finish their studies. Graduate Outcomes collection notices.

How long Goldsmiths retains personal data for

Goldsmiths will look to retain your personal data for as long as there is the lawful reason to do so unless you request that it be removed from the College’s records.

Once no such reason exists, your data will be deleted or, where deletion is not possible for technical reasons, it will be anonymised.

You may ask at any time for us to delete your personal data by contacting dp (@gold.ac.uk).

The legal basis for processing your data

Goldsmiths relies on several different legal bases. Depending on the processing being performed these may include one or more of the following:

• Consent – processing will sometimes be carried out in accordance with your consent
• Performance of the student contract – processing is required to fulfil the College’s contractual obligations to deliver your educational services
• Vital interest – to protect the vital interests of yourself or another, particularly in the case of medical emergencies
• Legal obligation – providing data to statutory and regulatory agencies
• Public interest – to enable teaching and research, which delivers a public and societal benefit
• Legitimate interests – a vibrant and engaged alumni community supports and enhances the teaching and research of the College, having taken account of the privacy rights and freedoms of alumni

Your rights

Privacy legislation gives you have a number of rights to decide how your personal data is collected and processed. Details of these are contained within the general information on our website.

See general privacy information on how we process personal data and other privacy notices.

Further information regarding your rights as an individual is available from the Information Commissioners website.

You have a right to complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office about the way Goldsmiths processes your personal data. Details on how to complain can be found on the Office’s website.

Changes to this notice

This Notice may be amended or updated. Where this occurs, Goldsmiths will announce the change on its website. Once this has been done, you will be deemed to have accepted the change.

Contact details

Should you have any concern about your personal data at Goldsmiths please contact the Data Protection Officer by email via: dp (@gold.ac.uk).