Privacy Policy and Cookie Information

Introduction

Thank you for visiting the College of West Anglia. The College of West Anglia is committed to respecting your privacy and the privacy of every visitor to our website and we strive to take the appropriate measures to protect your personal information.

This privacy notice tells you what data we collect, what we do with your information, what we do to keep it secure and what rights and choices you have over your personal information.

When we refer to Data Protection Legislation this means the Data Protection Act 2018, GDPR (United Kingdom General Data Protection Regulation) (UK GDPR), the Privacy and Electronic Communications (EC Directive) Regulations 2003 and any legislation implemented in connection with the aforementioned legislation. 

The College of West Anglia is a “data controller”. This means that we are responsible for deciding how we hold and use personal information about you. We are required under Data Protection Legislation to notify you of the information contained in this privacy notice.

This privacy notice applies to students, prospective students and employees, and visitors who attend any of our campuses, visit our website and social media pages or contact the College by other means. If you want to know in detail what information the College collects, what it uses it for and why, as well as what your rights are, please click on all of the Privacy Notices below that are relevant to your relationship with the College:

• Privacy information for everyone

  Here at the College of West Anglia we take the privacy of your personal information very seriously. The College is a data controller and is registered with the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) (reference number Z6757611).

  The College is obliged by data protection legislation (The Data Protection Act (2018) and General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR)) to process your personal information in a transparent way, and to inform you of what is done with it. This information is set out below.

  The Data Protection Officer (DPO)

  The College has appointed a Data Protection Officer (DPO). They can be contacted on This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it., or by phone on 01553 815288. If you would prefer to write, the address is Data Protection Officer, The College of West Anglia, Tennyson Avenue, King’s Lynn, Norfolk, PE30 2QW.

  Please contact the Data Protection Officer if you have any queries or concerns about how your information is handled by the College or wish to exercise any of the rights you have related to your information given below in the section ‘Your rights in connection with your personal information’.

  Your rights in connection with your personal information

  Individuals have the following rights under GDPR:

  The right to be informed

  Individuals have the right to be informed about the collection and use of their personal data. This is a key transparency requirement under GDPR. The college must provide individuals with information including; the purpose for processing their personal data, the retention period for that personal data, and who it will be shared with. This is called ‘privacy information’. Privacy information must be provided to individuals at the time the personal data is collected from individuals.

  The right of access

  Individuals have the right to access the personal information that the college holds about you, by making a request. This is known as a ‘Subject Access Request’. If the college agrees we are obliged to provide your personal information to you. This will be provided free of charge and (where possible) within 30 days from when your identity has been confirmed. The college asks for proof of identity and sufficient information about your interactions with us so that we can locate your personal information and share it with confidence.

  If you would like to exercise this right, please contact the college’s Data Protection Officer (DPO) as set out above.

  The right to rectification

  GDPR gives individuals the right to have personal data rectified. Personal data can be rectified if it is inaccurate or incomplete. If any of the personal information we hold about you is inaccurate or out of date, please contact the DPO to correct it, as set out below.

  The right to erasure (the right to be forgotten)

  The right to erasure is also known as the ‘right to be forgotten’. The broad principle underpinning this right is to enable an individual to request the deletion or removal of personal data where there is no compelling reason for its continued processing. The right to erasure does not provide an absolute ‘right to be forgotten’. Individuals have a right to have personal data erased and to prevent processing in specific circumstances. If you would like more information, or would like to exercise this right, please contact the DPO, as set out below.

  The right to restrict processing

  Individuals have a right to ‘block’ or suppress processing of personal data. When processing is restricted, the college is permitted to store the personal data, but not to process it. The college is allowed to retain just enough information about the individual to ensure that the restriction is respected in future.

  The right to portability

  The right to data portability allows individuals to obtain and reuse their personal data for their own purposes across different services. It allows you to move, copy or transfer personal data easily from one IT environment to another in a safe and secure way, without hinderance to usability. The right to portability only applies to personal data an individual has provided to the college, where the processing is based on the individual’s consent or for the performance of a contract and when processing is carried out by automated means. If an individual requests for their personal data to be moved the college must provide the personal data in a structured, commonly used and machine-readable format. Open formats include CSV files.

  The right to object

  Individuals have the right to object to the college processing personal data for specific purposes. You will be informed of your right to object at the point of first communications if this applies and this will be detailed in the privacy notice for that first contact activity.

  The college will stop processing personal data for direct marketing purposes as soon as it receives an objection. The college recognises that there are no exemptions or grounds to refuse.

  Rights related to automated decision-making including profiling

  The college will only use automated decision making where the decision is necessary for the entry into or performance of a contract or is authorised by Union or member state law applicable to the college or is based on the individual’s explicit consent. The college will make sure that it gives the individual information about the processing and introduces simple ways for them to request human intervention or challenge a decision.

  If you have consented to the processing of your personal information, you have the right to withdraw this at any time. Once we have received notification that you have withdrawn your consent, we will no longer process that information and, subject to our retention policy, we will dispose of your personal data securely.

  If you want to access, correct, or request erasure of your personal information, object to its processing, or withdraw your consent for its processing, please contact the Data Protection Officer on the details given above.

  International Transfer

  From time to time we may transfer your personal information to our service providers based outside of the UK for the purposes described in this Privacy Policy. If we do this your personal information will continue to be subject to one or more appropriate safeguards set out in the law. These might be the use of standard contractual clauses in a form approved by regulators, or having our suppliers sign up to an independent privacy scheme approved by regulators.

  Subject Access Request and exercising other Data Protection related rights

  The right of subject access, allows to obtain a copy of your personal data as well as other supplementary information. 

  Under data protection legislation, you have the right to access the personal information that the college processes in relation to you, in order to ensure that the college is processing your information in accordance with the law. Please be aware that you can only ask for your own information, or for someone else’s information only with their permission under this process.

  If you wish to access any of the information that the college processes as part of its relationship with you, please contact the Data Protection Officer as detailed above. The Data Protection Officer will endeavour to respond to all requests within one calendar month.

  The more specific you can be about the information you require, and any detail you can provide about relevant staff members or any timeframe to which the information relates, the more quickly your request can be dealt with and the more likely you are to receive an answer with which you are satisfied.

  For more information about your privacy rights

  The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) is the UK’s independent authority that upholds information rights. It regulates how the College looks after your personal information. You have the right to make a complaint to the ICO about the way the College has handled your personal information, you can find out how through its website: https://ico.org.uk/. However, we hope that you would consider raising any issue or complaint you have with us first. Your satisfaction is extremely important to us, and we will always do our very best to solve any problems you may have.

• Privacy information for learners, apprentices and those applying to learn at the college

  The types of information we collect

  In connection with your application to learn with us, and if you go on to enrol with us as a learner, we will process the following categories of personal information about you:

  • The information you have provided to us in your application form or through the online application system, including name, title, address, telephone number, personal email address, date of birth, gender identity and qualifications.
  • Any information you provide to us during an open day, interview, or advice and guidance
  • Any further information related to your eligibility for the course you have applied for.

  If you enrol as a learner at the college, we will also collect:

  • The name and phone number of an emergency contact for you.
  • Your bank details if you will be funding your own course fees.
  • Information about what you are accessing when you use college IT facilities.

  We may also collect, store, and use the following “special categories” of more sensitive personal information:

  • Information about your race or ethnicity, religious beliefs, sexual orientation, and political opinions.
  • Information about your health, including any medical condition or disability for which you may require support, including any learning need or difficulty.
  • Information about criminal convictions and offences.

  The legal basis on which your information is processed

  In the main, we process your information on the legal basis of performance of a contract or to take steps…prior to entering into a contract (Article 6 1(c) of the GDPR).

  For purposes not directly related to your learning, for example confirming to your previous school or the local authority that you are enrolled here, we will process your information on the basis of those organisations’ legitimate interests.

  Occasionally, especially if we are collecting health-related information, we may require your consent for processing your information. Detail of this will be notified to you directly at the time.

  How your personal information is collected

  We collect personal information about learners and applicants from the following sources:

  • You, the data subject through the application form (paper and online) and enrolment form
  • UCAS (for HE courses).
  • Information from publicly accessible third parties, such as internet records and social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter.

  How the College uses your information when you apply for a course

  On this basis, during the learner application process, we use the personal information we collect about you to:

  • Assess your skills, qualifications, and suitability for your chosen course.
  • Communicate with you about the application and enrolment processes.
  • Administer and facilitate the course(s) of learning that you undertake with us.
  • Comply with legal or regulatory requirements.
  • If you visit a college site, your image may be captured and stored on our CCTV systems. All CCTV footage is routinely overwritten unless an image or footage needs to be kept for longer in order to aid e.g., a police investigation.

  How the College uses your information when you are an enrolled learner

  • Your information will be used to ensure you have a place on the correct course, to monitor your progress and attendance on that course and to facilitate the award of the qualification you achieve.
  • Your information will be shared with your tutor and other staff who may support you, such as learning support officers and careers advisors.
  • Your personal details, course progress and support needs, as well as absence reports made by you to the college will be kept on EBS, the central student management database. The information in this system is used by further internal systems that support your learning and relationship with the college, such as LEARN, Student Portal, and the E-ILP.
  • Relevant personal details will be used to provide the facilities you require for your learning, such as access to IT equipment and the Learning Resource Centre (RLC). Your image, name and student number will be used to provide you with your ID card, which you must wear at all times.
  • When you are using College computers, the information you are accessing will be monitored in order to alert us to any safeguarding issues, so that we are able to keep you and other learners safe.
  • If you have cause to use the complaints process or are subject to the college’s disciplinary process during your time at the college, staff will share relevant information with colleagues as necessary in order to investigate any matter and provide an outcome to you.
  • Your image will be captured by CCTV cameras inside and outside college premises. These images will be routinely overwritten unless an image or footage needs to be kept for longer in order to aid e.g. a police investigation.

  How the College uses your sensitive personal information

  We will use your particularly sensitive (special category) personal information in the following ways:

  • If applicable, we will use information about your health condition, disability or support needs to consider whether we need to provide appropriate adjustments during the recruitment process, for example whether adjustments need to be made during a test or interview. We will also use this information to ensure we are supporting you adequately with your course and during your examinations. If you receive support from the College’s Additional Learning Support (ALS) team, please also see the Privacy Notice for learners who access additional learning support.
  • We will use information about your race or national or ethnic origin, religious, philosophical, or moral beliefs, or sexual orientation, to ensure meaningful equal opportunity monitoring and reporting.

  How the College of West Anglia College shares your information

  • If your course is funded by the Education and Skills Funding Agency (ESFA), the College will share your personal information with it for audit purposes. The ESFA is responsible for the funding and planning of education and training for young people and adults in England. The ESFA also administers the Learner Records Service (LRS) which will use your information to create and maintain a unique learner number (ULN). You can read more about the LRS here at: https://www.gov.uk/education/learning-records-lrs.
  • If your course is funded by an organisation other than the ESFA, or you undertake a funded placement while at college such as those available, your information will be shared with these organisations in order to enable your teaching or work experience to take place and for reporting purposes where necessary.
  • Your name only will be shared with any organisation that you might undertake a work experience placement with outside the college if this has been arranged by the college’s work experience team.
  • If you apply for an apprenticeship your details may be shared with potential employers and associated organisations.
  • If your course is provided by another education provider on behalf of the College of West Anglia, your information will be shared with this provider as necessary in order for your learning to take place.
  • Your personal information, and academic progress information, will be shared with exam boards and other qualification-awarding bodies in order for you to be awarded the qualification you have enrolled on and to assure the quality of the tuition you are receiving from the college.
  • Other organisations that we may share information include:
    • the Department for Education
    • Borough Council King’s Lynn & West Norfolk and other local Councils
    • the Student Loans Company
    • the Higher Education Statistics Agency
    • Ofsted
  • If we have a safeguarding concern about you, we may share necessary information regarding that concern with the Police and other organisations and agencies such as local authorities, in order to keep you safe.

  How long the College will retain your information

  • If you apply to study with us and do not receive an offer, or do not enrol after having been offered a place, we will keep your information for a maximum of six months after your last contact with the college.
  • If you are a learner with the college, the college will keep your personal information for at least seven years after the last time you finish your learning with the College. If you are on an ESFA Funded course this information may be kept for longer. Detail about how long the College of West Anglia keeps personal information for can be found in its data retention and disposal policy, which is available on request.

  Information about criminal convictions

  In the event a check of this nature is required as part of your enrolling on a relevant course at the college, such as one in healthcare or early years, you will be asked to supply all necessary information for this directly.

  How the college communicates with those that have applied to learn here

  • You will not receive any marketing emails or phone calls from us unless you have opted to receive these. You can unsubscribe from these at any time or change the way we contact you, for example, by email, post, telephone or SMS, by emailing This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or calling us on 01553 761144.
  • If you have applied to learn with us and opted out of marketing communications, we will still contact you with information relevant to the course you are considering or the activities that will lead up to your enrolment.

• Privacy information for job applicants, staff and others working at the college

  The types of information we collect

  In connection with your application for work, and if you work for us, we will process the following categories of personal information about you:

  • The information you have provided to us in your application documents (CV, covering letter or supporting statement) including name, title, address, telephone number, personal email address, date of birth, gender identity, employment history and qualifications.
  • Any information you provide to us during interview and the results of any assessment
  • Copies of right to work documentation and references.

  If you work for us, your personal information will be stored in the databases that hold staff personal files and related information. It will also be held in payroll and other related systems in order to facilitate your employment with the college. This information will include the categories of information related to recruitment above, and:

  • Your national insurance number, bank account details, payroll records and tax status information.
  • Any relevant pensions or benefits information and information for other pay deductions, such as student loans.
  • Marital status and dependents.
  • Start date and, if different, the date of your continuous employment, along with your leaving date and your reason for leaving.
  • Location of employment or workplace.
  • Copy of driving licence if required for Occupational Driving purposes or for checking your identity.
  • Performance related information, including records of any grievance or disciplinary processes.

  We may also collect, store, and use the following “special categories” of more sensitive personal information:

  • Information about your race or ethnicity, religious beliefs, sexual orientation, political opinions, and trade union membership.
  • Information about your health, including any medical condition, disability, and health and sickness records.
  • Details of any absences (other than holidays) from work including time on parental leave
  • If you leave employment for a health-related reason, information about that condition needed for pensions and permanent health insurance purposes.
  • Information about criminal convictions and offences.

  How your personal information is collected

  We collect personal information about candidates and staff from the following sources:

  • You, the data subject.
  • Recruitment agencies, from which we collect the following categories of data: name, address, work history, qualifications, current salary information, referees, any current DBS checks.
  • Disclosure and Barring Service in respect of criminal conviction.
  • Your named referees, from whom we collect the following categories of data: dates worked, job title and suitability for new position.
  • Information from publicly accessible third parties, such as internet records and social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

  The legal bases on which your information is processed

  In the main, we process your information on the legal basis of performance of a contract or to take steps…prior to entering into a contract (Article 6 1(c) of the GDPR). Sometimes we are acting on our legal obligation to comply with employment or equality legislation.

  How the College uses your information when you apply for a job vacancy

  We will use the personal information we collect about you during the job recruitment process to:

  • Assess your skills, qualifications, and suitability for the role.
  • Carry out background and reference checks, where applicable.
  • Communicate with you about the recruitment process.
  • Keep records related to our hiring processes.
  • Comply with legal or regulatory requirements, such as checking you are legally entitled to work in the UK.

  How the College uses your information when you work with us

  If you go on to work for us, we will use your information to:

  • Administer the contract we have entered into with you, which includes maintaining a record of your employment performance, including Professional Development Record outcomes, and any disciplinary or grievance process.
  • Monitor our equality, diversity, and inclusion compliance.
  • Pay you, deduct tax, pension contributions and any student loan payments that may be payable.
  • Provide voluntary employee benefits to you.
  • Monitor your use of college IT facilities in order to ensure your welfare and that of other staff and the college’s learners.
  • Monitor your CPD activity and suggest CPD opportunities to you.
  • Inform and manage administrative processes at the College, such as the curriculum planning process.
  • Your image will be captured by CCTV cameras inside and outside College sites. These images will be routinely overwritten unless an image or footage needs to be kept for longer for compliance with a legal obligation, such as a police investigation.

  How the College uses your sensitive personal information

  We will use your particularly sensitive (special category) personal information in the following ways:

  • We will use information about your physical or mental health, or disability status, to ensure your health and safety in the workplace and to assess your fitness to work, to provide appropriate workplace adjustments, to monitor and manage sickness absence and to administer benefits including statutory maternity and paternity pay, statutory sick pay, and pensions.
  • We will use information you have provided about your race or national or ethnic origin, religious, philosophical, or moral beliefs, or sexual orientation, to ensure meaningful equality, diversity and inclusion monitoring and reporting.
  • We will use trade union membership information to pay trade union subscriptions if paid through the payroll, register the status of a protected employee and to comply with employment law obligations.

  Information about criminal convictions

  • Because the majority of our learners are under 18, we are legally obliged to adequately check the criminal conviction history of college employees to ensure that we are meeting our safeguarding obligations.

  • In the event a check of this nature is required as part of your taking up employment with the College, you will be asked to supply all necessary information for this directly.

  How the College might share your information

  If you have cause to use the complaints or grievance procedures or are subject to the college’s disciplinary process during your time at the college, staff will share relevant information with colleagues as necessary in order to investigate any matter and provide an outcome to you.

  Third party organisations that the college will share your information with include:

  • Occupational health and sickness absence information.
  • The College’s payroll processor.
  • The disclosure and barring service.
  • Qualification awarding bodies, e.g. Pearson.
  • iTrent – the database in which HR personal files are kept.
  • Your pension scheme provider (usually the Teachers’ or Local Government Pension Scheme).
  • Ofsted

  How long the College will retain your information

  If you apply for a position and are not appointed, we will retain your personal information for a period of 6 months after we have communicated to you our decision about whether to appoint you. After this period, we will securely destroy your personal information.

  If we wish to retain your personal information after you have applied for a job with us, on the basis that we may wish to consider you for a future position, we will write to you separately.

  If you are successful in your appointment, the personal information from your application that is relevant to your employment will form part of your personal record as a member of staff at the college. Your personal employment record will be retained until 7 years after the end of your appointment to the college. Certain information such as that related to pension contributions will be kept for up to 75 years. For more detail on how long different types of information are retained by the College, please see the Data retention and disposal policy, available on request.

  If you fail to provide personal information

  If you fail to provide information when requested which is necessary for us to consider your application (such as evidence of qualifications or work history), we will not be able to process your application successfully and may not be able to take it all the way through the recruitment process.

• Privacy information for those accessing additional learning support

  As a learner at the College of West Anglia, what is done with your personal information in order to facilitate your course is detailed in Privacy information for learners, apprentices and those applying to learn at the college above.

  The types of information we collect

  Directly from you, we will collect detail of any condition relevant to your course, and any detail you can give of adjustment that you require in order to ensure that you are not disadvantaged in your learning at the college.

  We will also keep ongoing records of your consultations with those staff helping to support you in your time at college.

  With your consent, we will approach the school or college that you have attended most recently in order to understand what adjustment had been made for you in previous educational establishments.

  The legal bases on which your information is processed

  In the main, we process your information on the legal basis of the performance of the contract that we enter into with you when you become a learner at the college. Where we are collecting any information relating to a health condition or disability that you have and the support needs associated with it, we will seek your consent to process this information and what we do with it, such as approaching your previous school to ask for relevant information.

  How your personal information is collected

  We collect personal information about learners and applicants from the following sources:

  • You, the data subject.
  • Schools or colleges that you have attended previously, but only with your consent.
  • Other professionals that may have been involved in supporting you, such as medical professionals, again this contact would only be made with your consent.

  How the College uses your information

  Information related to any health condition or disability that you disclose to our staff will, with your consent, be used to provide adjustment to any relevant process within the college to ensure that you do not suffer any disadvantage relative to anyone else. This can include adjustment to admissions processes, teaching provision and exam arrangements as well as other adjustments on a more ad hoc basis as required.

  How the College of West Anglia shares your information

  In order to assist you with every aspect of college life where it might be necessary, we may need to share information about your health condition to keep you safe, or your disability to ensure that required adjustments are made for you. With your consent and awareness, this information may therefore be shared with the staff who teach you and interact with you in other ways. It will never be shared other than with staff who need to know about it. We may also share your information with Ofsted.

  How long the College will retain your information

  We will keep your personal information for at least seven years after the last time you finish your learning with the college. If you are on an ESFA Funded course this information may be kept for longer.

• Privacy information for website users

  The types of information we collect

  The College of West Anglia website collects information about how you use our website when you visit it, so that we can tailor the information you see to what you are interested in. The personal information you provide when you visit the college’s website is processed on the legal basis of our legitimate interest in making the experience of the college’s website as valuable as possible to all its visitors, including you.

  How your personal information is collected and used

  Cookies

  Cookies are tiny pieces of data sent from our website and stored in a user’s web browser. At the College of West Anglia we limit the use of cookies to first-party only which means that no information is passed to third parties. However, you may prefer to disable cookies on this site and on others. The most effective way to do this is to disable cookies in your browser. We suggest consulting the Help section of your browser or taking a look at the About Cookies website which offers guidance for all modern browsers.

  Managing Cookies

  You can opt out of specific cookies in different ways depending on your browser. However, this may affect the performance and functionality of the website on the device, which you opt out from.

  • If you are on Chrome
  • If you are on Internet Explorer
  • If you are on Edge
  • If you are on Firefox
  • If you are on Opera
  • If you are on Safari

  Google Analytics (Universal Analytics and GA4)

  • These cookies are used to collect information about how visitors use our site. They are used to "remember" what a user has done on previous pages/interactions with our website.
  • Google Analytics collects IP address information, but this is not available to be viewed directly by the College of West Anglia in the Google Analytics platform. Instead, it is used for approximated geolocation information such as Country, Town/City etc.
  • Google Analytics does not store or allow the use of Personal Identifiable Information (PII) to be stored on its platform, this would be a violation of the Google Analytics usage policy.

  Read more of the Google Analytics privacy policy

  IP address

  • IP address data is captured anonymously in situations such as application/server logs. This is for security/auditing purposes.
  • IP address data is not stored against personal identifiable information in our website.
  • We use an IP address lookup service which performs queries against a WHOIS database to determine the Service Provider, network, and type of organisation (e.g. business, education establishment or Internet Service Provider) an IP address is registered to. IP address data collected is not stored by this service and only returns the result from the WHOIS database for reporting and analytics purposes.

  Social Media

  • Social cookies are used to help tailor your user experience.
  • On some pages there is the option to share the page with social media sites such as Facebook or Twitter.
  • These cookies are only used if the visitor chooses to share the page by clicking on the links.
  • Follow the link for details of the Facebook privacy policy
  • Follow the link for details on the Twitter privacy policy

  YouTube

  • On some pages of our website we have embedded YouTube videos from our dedicated YouTube channel.
  • If you choose to view these videos, YouTube may place additional cookies to track video activity.
  • Follow the link for details of the YouTube privacy policy

  SharpSpring Marketing Automation and CRM

  SharpSpring is a marketing automation software that the college uses as part of its CRM (Customer Relationship Management) system. This system help us to design emails that we send to users which allows them to easily unsubscribe from receiving any more emails from us if they choose to do so and manage their marketing preferences. When users click on a link from an email, sent to the college website, the system is able to see which link users have clicked on and what information they may be interested to receive.

  Twilio

  We also use Twilio with SharpSpring and our CRM. While there are no Twilio cookies used on our website, using Twilio allows us to send text messages to specific groups of people such as a specific group of students for those who have opted in to receive communications, and in times of need such as during a closure due to severe weather such as snow.

  Eventbrite

  Personal data will be collected from you when you register to attend an event at the college using Eventbrite. The information you provide will be used to process your booking and it will be used to contact you via Eventbrite about your booking. You may also be contacted to undertake a post-event evaluation and provide marketing information about courses and events and other products and services offered by the college. All marketing communications will incorporate a link enabling you to opt-out of receiving further communications.

  Eventbrite is a third-party service that is not owned or managed by the college of West Anglia.

  • Eventbrite terms and conditions
  • Eventbrite privacy policy

  If you wish to attend one of our events but do not wish to use Eventbrite to book a place, please contact us on 01553 761144.

  AbilityNet

  The college wants as many people as possible to be able to use this website. AbilityNet software is on the site to allow you to use the site for speech, reading and translation support. Find out more about how we’re making our website accessible by visiting: https://cwa.ac.uk/accessibility

  You will be able see a wheelchair icon at the top right hand corner of the accessibility web page. This is AbilityNet, and by clicking on it, this allows you to do a range of things including enlarging the size of text, changing the colour and contrast of a page, letting it read the text on a page to you or highlighting text and allowing the reader to read it back out loud, among many other useful features. This software is used to make sure that our website is as accessible to as many people as possible, including those with reading, visual or hearing impairments.

  Facebook Pixel

  The college uses Facebook Pixel on the website. This conversion tracking helps us to measure the return on investment of our Facebook Ads by reporting on the actions people take after viewing those ads. Advertisers can create pixels that track conversions, add them to the pages of their website where the conversions will happen, and then track these conversions back to ads they are running on Facebook. We use the conversion pixel to retarget adverts towards people who have visited the college website on occasion.

  To opt out of these, click here to update your settings on Facebook

  Remarketing

  We use Remarketing within platforms like Google Ads, Facebook, Twitter and TikTok to advertise online and make ads more relevant. If the user has accepted our cookie consent banner message, this acts as consent mechanism to enable remarketing/advertising features for these services.

  Remarketing cookies will be used by third parties to show our ads on websites other than our own. This could mean that we advertise to previous visitors on third parties websites based on their interaction with our website, for example you may see an advert for a course because you’ve visited that course page. Any data collected will be used in conjunction with our privacy policy.

  • You can set your advertising preferences in relation to how Google advertises to you
  • View Facebook’s privacy policy
  • View Twitter’s privacy policy
  • View TikTok's privacy policy

  How long the College of West Anglia will retain your information

  The information gathered through cookies is deleted every two years. If you have signed up to a mailing list through our website, these details will be kept until you unsubscribe from the relevant list.

• Privacy information for Parents and Guardians

  Privacy information for those with parental or next of kin responsibility for the College of West Anglia students

  The types of information we collect

  We may collect, use, and share your personal information in order to protect the health and wellbeing of our students and support their learning and development.

  The categories of your personal information that we collect, store and share include:

  • Personal information (such as name and contact details)
  • Contact history (such as correspondence/notes)

  We may also collect, store, and use the following “special categories” of more sensitive personal information:

  Any information relating to a health condition or resulting adjustment needs that we may need in order to facilitate your participation in any events such as open evenings or end of year shows. This information will be supplied directly by you and only used on the basis of your consent.

  The legal bases on which your information is processed

  Where our students are over 18, we will process your information on the basis of the college performing its task in the public interest (that of educating our students).

  On occasion, we may process your information on the basis of fulfilling our legal obligations to safeguard our students and provide information related to their academic progress to those with parental responsibility.

  If you are the next of kin of a student at the college, we will use your contact details in the event of an emergency on the basis of our students’ vital interests.

  How your personal information is collected

  We collect personal information about individuals who have parental and next of kin responsibility for our students at enrolment and occasionally over the course of the academic year. You will have provided your details yourself, or they will have been provided by the student(s) for whom you have responsibility.

  How the College uses your information

  We use your information to:

  • Contact you in the case of an emergency

  If you are the parent or guardian of one of our students, we will process your information to:

  • Comply with legal obligations around the health, safety, and wellbeing of our students, including Ofsted inspections
  • Support our student’s learning
  • Report on student progress
  • Facilitate the provision of appropriate guidance and pastoral support
  • Assess and improve the quality of our services.

  How the College of West Anglia shares your information

  The College of West Anglia will not share your information unless legally obliged to do so, for example with the police in the event of a welfare concern related to the student for whom you have responsibility.

  We will only share your data with third parties where there is a legal obligation to do so, including the ESFA, Learner Records Service (LRS), examination bodies, Student Loans Company (SLC) and local authorities.

  We may also share your personal data with other organisations in the following circumstances:

  • If the law or a public authority says that the college must share the personal data
  • If the college needs to share personal data in order to establish, exercise or defend its legal rights (this includes providing personal data to others for the purposes of preventing fraud and reducing credit risk); or
  • From time to time, employ the services of other parties for dealing with certain processes necessary for the operation of the website. However, all the information we share will be collected and anonymised, so neither you nor any of your devices can be identified from it.
  • We may also engage non-statutory third parties to process personal data on our behalf, for example to follow up course applications during busy periods, help us deliver our services to you or undertake research. When we do this, we require these parties (data processors) to do so on the basis of written instructions, under a duty of confidentiality and an obligation to implement appropriate technical and organisational measures to ensure the security of data, and to never use it for their own direct marketing purposes. We will only disclose the personal information that is necessary to carry out the task or provide the service to you on our behalf.

  The College of West Anglia will share your data with Anglia Ruskin University to facilitate the delivery and evaluation of the Higher Education programmes they run with students in the college as a part of the UCWA (University Centre West Anglia). In collaboration with LiNCHigher, a targeted outreach programme, your personal information will be shared if you attend if you take part in any LiNCHigher activity at the college.

  • The privacy notice for ARU students can be found here: https://www.aru.ac.uk/privacy-and-cookies/current-prospective-students
  • The privacy notice for LiNCHigher found here: https://www.thefuturefocus.co.uk/privacy-policy/

  How long the College will retain your information

  Detail about how long the College of West Anglia keeps personal information can be found in its data retention and disposal policy, available on request. Parental information comes under ‘Records documenting the registration of individual students on programmes’. This information is kept for a further six years following the end of the academic year in which the student leaves the college. We are required to hold safeguarding records for a set period of time and, on some rare occasions, your personal information may be included in these records and therefore held for up to ten years.

The Data Protection Officer (DPO)

The College has appointed a Data Protection Officer (DPO). They can be contacted on This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it., or by phone on 01553 815288. If you would prefer to write, the address is Data Protection Officer, The College of West Anglia, Tennyson Avenue, King’s Lynn, Norfolk, PE30 2QW.

Please contact the Data Protection Officer if you have any queries or concerns about how your information is handled by the College or wish to exercise any of the rights you have related to your information given in the section above ‘Your rights in connection with your personal information’.