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As part of any recruitment process, the Stephen Perse Foundation (the Foundation) collects and processes personal data relating to job applicants.

We are committed to being transparent about how we collect and use that data and to meeting our data protection obligations.

What information do we collect?

Initial application

We collect a range of information about you. This includes:

  • your name, address and contact details, including email address and telephone number;
  • details of your qualifications, skills, training, experience, professional memberships and employment history;
  • information about your current level of remuneration, including benefit entitlements;
  • whether or not you have a disability for which we need to make reasonable adjustments during the recruitment process;
  • whether or not you have a criminal record, have been the subject of a child protection investigation, or worked outside the UK in the previous five years;
  • information about your entitlement to work in the UK, including your National Insurance Number and/or Teacher Number;
  • if you have any personal relationships with anyone associated with the Foundation; and
  • your comments relating to your suitability for the role and your personal interests.

We also ask you to provide the contact details of two referees whom we will contact to obtain references for you. We assume that you have obtained their consent to give their details to us. For some roles we may contact the referees only for the successful candidate after interview, but for all teaching roles and many support roles, we will contact the referees for all shortlisted candidates before the interviews take place, in accordance with the guidelines on Safer Recruitment.

Information which is mandatory for you to provide is marked with an *. If you choose not to provide this information, you will not be able to submit the application form or be considered for the role.

Shortlisted candidates

If you are shortlisted for interview, we will ask you to bring your passport or other identity documents providing proof of your entitlement to work in the UK, your full birth certificate, photo identification, a utility or council tax bill and any professional qualification certificates. We will take a copy of these documents to keep on your application record.

Further personal data will be collected through interviews or other forms of assessment.

Successful candidates

With the exception of your nominated referees for references for certain roles as detailed above, we will seek information from third parties only once a job offer to you has been made, such as from the Disclosure & Barring Service (DBS) or from former employers.

Application data will be stored in a range of different places, as appropriate, including on our HR management systems and on other IT systems (including email).

Why does the Foundation process personal data? 

We need to process data to take steps at your request prior to entering into an employment contract with you. We may also need to process your data to enter into a contract with you. In some cases, we need to process data to ensure that we are complying with our legal obligations. For example, it is mandatory to check a successful applicant's eligibility to work in the UK before employment starts and, for all roles at the Foundation, to complete DBS checks on all candidates who are offered employment.

The Foundation has a legitimate interest in processing personal data during the recruitment process and for keeping records of the process. Processing data from job applicants allows us to manage the recruitment process, assess and confirm a candidate's suitability for employment and decide to whom to offer a job. We may also need to process data from job applicants to respond to and defend against legal claims.

We will collect information about whether or not applicants are disabled so that we can make reasonable adjustments for candidates who have a disability. We process such information to carry out our legal obligations and exercise specific rights in relation to employment.

Who has access to your personal data?

Your information will be shared internally for the purposes of the recruitment exercise. This includes members of the HR and recruitment team, interviewers involved in the recruitment process and managers in the business area with a vacancy.

With the exception of your nominated referees for references for certain roles as detailed above, we will not share your data with third parties, unless we make you a conditional offer of employment. We will then share your data with certain third parties in order to comply with our legal obligations. These legal obligations include contacting former employers to obtain references for you if not completed beforehand, employment background check providers to obtain necessary background checks, the Disclosure & Barring Service and the Teaching Regulation Agency.

Successful candidates will also be asked to complete a confidential medical questionnaire, which will be sent by the candidate directly to the Foundation’s Occupational Health Service (Oh Occupational Health & Wellbeing) for assessment. Information about a disability or medical condition will only be reported to us in general terms of the candidate's ability to perform the job. This will allow any health and safety risk to be assessed and reasonable adjustment considered. The candidate’s permission will be sought by Oh Occupational Health & Wellbeing before sharing any other medical information with us.

How does the Foundation protect data?

We take the security of your data seriously. We have internal policies and controls in place to ensure that your data is not lost, accidentally destroyed, misused or disclosed, and is not accessed except by those employees who require access to it in the proper performance of their duties.

For how long does the Foundation keep data?

If your application is unsuccessful, or you choose not to accept any offer of employment we make, your personal data will be kept for six months after the end of the relevant recruitment stage, after which it will be automatically destroyed. You are free to ask us to delete your data at any time.

If your application for employment is successful, personal data gathered during the recruitment process will be transferred to your Personnel File (which will be stored electronically on the Foundation’s management information systems) and retained during your employment with the Foundation. The periods for which your data will be held, together with further information about how the Foundation collects and uses your personal information, will be provided to you in a staff privacy notice.

Your rights

As a data subject, you have a number of rights. You can:

  • access and obtain a copy of your data on request;
  • require us to change incorrect or incomplete data;
  • require us to delete or stop processing your data, for example where the data is no longer necessary for the purposes of processing; and
  • object to the processing of your data where the Foundation is relying on its legitimate interests as the legal ground for processing.

If you would like to exercise any of these rights, or have any questions about this policy or the information we hold about you, please contact recruitment@stephenperse.com.

If you believe that we have not complied with your data protection rights, you can complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) although the ICO recommends that steps are taken to resolve the matter with us before involving them.

What if you do not want to provide personal data?

You are under no obligation to provide personal data to the Foundation during the recruitment process. However, if you do not provide the information, we may not be able to process your application properly or at all.