Update to Privacy Notice: Data Sharing with the Department for Education (DfE)
Schools are legally obligated to provide certain information about your child/children to both the local authority and the Department for Education (DfE); details about this can be found in our Parent & Pupil Privacy Notice.
This year, an update to existing legislation (Education (Information about Individual Pupils) (England) (Amendment) Regulations 2024) means that we will now be obligated to provide additional information to the DfE, on a daily basis. This information will be your child's/children’s identifiers, age, ethnicity, gender, and daily school attendance information, along with whether or not your child/children are eligible for free school meals, have special educational needs, have an EHCP, or is or have been a looked after child.
As this is a large amount of information to be provided on a daily basis, the DfE have provided a means by which the transfer can be sent automatically. This is by using a system called Wonde, which pulls the requested information from the school’s existing computer systems, and sends it directly to the DfE. This system has been fully tested, and meets information security expectations.
For information about what the DfE will do with this data, please see their Privacy Notice at https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/65115a04bf7c1a0011bb4640/Privacy_notice_for_schools_daily_attendance_collection.pdf
If you do not wish for the school to share your child's/children's data with the DfE using Wonde, please could you raise an Objection to Processing to the school office, for the school to consider your concerns. Please note, however, that this wouldn’t prevent us from sharing the information with the DfE, as we are legally obligated to do so.
If you have any questions or concerns about the DfE’s use of your child's/children's personal data in this manner, we recommend you address these directly with the DfE, or to the Information Commissioner’s Office
