The Education Training Foundation takes its duty to process your personal data seriously. This Privacy Notice explains how we collect, manage, use and protect your personal data, and sets out your related rights and options.
1 Introduction
1.1 This notice references the Education Training Foundation (ETF, we, us, our), a registered charity (registration no: 1153859) and company limited by guarantee (company registration number (England and Wales): 08540597).
1.2 ETF is the expert body for professional development and standards in further education (FE) and skills in England. Our role is to design, develop and deliver continuous professional development (CPD) for teachers, leaders and trainers to support government policy and meet sector needs. We have a charitable purpose to improve education and training for learners aged 14 and over. We receive funding from the Department for Education, more information about our funding can be found here.
1.3 ETF is also the membership body dedicated to professionals working across further education, vocational teaching and training. It helps the careers of professionals working across the sector, inspiring them to be even better, and, connecting them with thousands of like-minded professionals and experts. It aims to raise the status of the profession, champion the quality of the sector’s professionals, and provide access to the best research and expert views there are.
1.4 This Privacy Notice explains how and why we use your personal data, and sets out your related rights and options. We are committed to ensuring that your privacy is protected in accordance with the law.
1.5 We may change this notice from time to time by updating this page. You should check this page from time to time to ensure that you are happy with any changes. Please read the following carefully to understand our views and practices regarding your personal data and how we will treat it.
2. What types of personal data do we collect and use?
“Personal data” is any information from which you can be identified, whether directly from that information alone or indirectly in combination with other information.
ETF collects and uses the following types of personal data:
· Name and biographical details such as nationality, gender and date of birth.
· Contact details (phone number, postal address and email address) and emergency contact details (including next of kin information).
· Teacher reference number (if applicable).
· Affiliated organisations (e.g. professional membership bodies).
· Current job role / post and basic details of employment.
· Academic and professional qualifications, current affiliations and employment history.
· Motivations, competencies, interests.
· Details of participation in ETF courses, including information about progress and attainment.
· Information about how you use our website, apps or other technology.
· Photos and video footage, for example for premises access requirements, security reasons (such as CCTV) or for promotional / marketing purposes.
· Profile data – such as your username, password, profile photo and feedback you choose to share in relation to an ETF course.
· Correspondence between us.
· Financial information (for example payment card information or bank account details).
We may also collect and process technical information about your computer, including (where available) your Internet Protocol address, login information, operating system and browser type and version, for system administration purposes and to report aggregate information to other organisations (including our funders). When reporting to other organisations, this is statistical data about the browsing actions and patterns of usage of our sites and does not (of itself) identify any individual by name.
We also collect and use “special categories” of personal data – these are types of personal data which are innately more sensitive and private and therefore given additional protection under applicable law. We use the following types of your special category personal data:
· Information about your physical and mental health (as may be relevant and applicable to your participation in an ETF course, for example if you are unable to attend a session due to illness or in case you need any reasonable adjustments or access requirements).
· Information about your religious beliefs (for example so that we can facilitate any prayer or dietary requirements).
· Information about your racial / ethnic origin (to monitor and ensure equality of opportunity and treatment).
3 How do we collect your personal data?
We collect and access your personal data in a variety of ways, including (non-exhaustively):
· Directly from you when you access or register to use an ETF website or programme, book onto any of our courses or programmes; subscribe to our newsletters and communications; join or renew your membership; subscribe to receive information updates; attending ETF events. or when creating an ETF user account or profile.
· From your employer when they sign you up for an ETF course.
· From suppliers who assist us in providing certain elements of our services.
· When you visit and interact with our website (via technologies such as cookies and web beacons). Please see our cookie notice here.
· From public sources (such as when you interact with us on social media).
4 Why do we process your personal data?
ETF collects and uses personal data for a broad range of purposes, non-exhaustively including the following:
· To enroll you on an ETF course, administer you participation and provide you with your results and any certification.
· To operate, manage, develop and improve our organisation and our products and services.
· To promote ETF’s products and services and provide you with any information about those products and services which you have either requested or which we think might be of interest.
· For internal record keeping and audit purposes.
· To provide a personalised or tailored experience of our products and services and to customise our website according to your interests and user preferences.
· To operate and administer our premises and keep them secure, and to protect ETF from fraud, money-laundering, intellectual property theft or other crimes or unlawful conduct.
· To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations and to bring and defend legal claims.
· To comply with contractual obligations.
· To invite you to and administer ETF events.
· To monitor and ensure equality of opportunity and treatment.
· To include in management information, statistical analysis and internal and external research.
· To measure the impact and effectiveness of our progress and courses, our events and our online advertising.
· For marketing, promotional and communications purposes, including contacting you with programme and course options in the future.
5 Our ‘lawful bases’ for processing your personal data
We can only collect and use your personal data lawfully where we have a “lawful basis” to do so. A lawful basis is just a reason or justification for using personal data which is accepted and recognised by the UK GDPR.
Depending on the circumstances and nature of our interaction, ETF relies on the following lawful bases:
· Where it is necessary to use your personal data to perform a contract with you (e.g. if you have signed up to one of our courses or become an ETF member).
· Where you have provided us with your consent in advance for us to use your personal data in a certain way (for example when we ask for your consent to send you ETF marketing / promotional material or to be included in any of our promotional materials).
· Where it is necessary to use your personal data to comply with a legal obligation which is binding on ETF (for example responding to a subject access request or performing actions required in a court order).
· Where necessary to achieve ETF’s, or another organisation’s or person’s “legitimate interests”. A legitimate interest is just a good, valid and genuinely-held reason for using personal data, for example disclosing information when requested by law enforcement authorities, promoting ETF’s products and services, asking you to complete surveys linked to courses you have participated or your current job, inviting you to join participation or special interest groups or to receive background services, such as data analytics, system security or identifying usage trends and patterns to determine the effectiveness and popularity of our products and services.
When we collect and use your special category personal data (please see section 2 above), we are required to have a secondary lawful basis in place. Non-exhaustively the secondary lawful bases ETF relies on are:
· Where you have provided your explicit written consent for us to use your special category personal data in a certain way.
· Where it is necessary to use your special category personal data in genuine medical emergencies.
· Where it is necessary to use your special category personal data in the context of legal disputes.
· Where it is necessary to use your special category personal data for medical diagnosis or the provision of health care.
· Where is it is necessary to use your special category personal data for reasons of substantial public interest, such as ensuring and monitoring equality of opportunity and treatment, exercising protective functions over vulnerable individuals, preventing or detecting unlawful conduct or safeguarding vulnerable individuals who are at risk.
6 How we keep your personal data secure
6.1 All information you provide to us is stored on secure servers. We adopt appropriate technical and organisational measures to protect the security of all personal data held by ETF, including sensitive personal data. All payment transactions are encrypted and stored securely.
6.2 Although we try to ensure your personal data is protected, we cannot guarantee the security of your data transmitted to our site; any transmission of data is at your own risk. Once we have received your information, we will use strict procedures and security features to try to prevent unauthorised access.
7 Do we share your personal data outside the business?
Sometimes it may be necessary to disclose your personal data to external organisations, for example:
· To professional advisers such as lawyers, accountants and auditors.
· To your employer, if they have arranged for your participation in an ETF course or program.
· To trusted partner organisations, such as our training partners or event organisers.
· To the Department for Education, or other government department, where ETF delivers government-funded work.
· Third-party suppliers who provide outsourced services to ETF.
· To medical professionals in the event of medical emergencies.
· In exceptional circumstances, to law enforcement authorities, competent regulatory or governmental bodies or agencies or litigation counterparties.
· Where we are required to do so by law (for example sending tax information to HMRC).
· To provide your with a service or information including any benefits and services (including those which may be related to your ETF membership) provided by third parties.
Where we engage suppliers to collect, access and use your personal data on our behalf, we carry out due diligence in advance to ensure that they can comply with applicable data protection law (and facilitate compliance with your data protection rights), and we sign them up to contractual terms which mean that you can enforce any data protection rights or obligations which have not been complied with and take direct action to recover any losses you may have suffered.
8 Do we transfer your personal information to locations outside the UK?
As ETF is a UK-based organisation, the majority of processing activities which affect your personal data will take place in the UK. However, we may occasionally need to transfer your personal data overseas or allow access to it from overseas (for example where we work with a partner organisation based outside the UK, where our suppliers’ servers or systems are based outside the UK or if your employer is located outside the UK). Where this involves sending (or facilitating access) to a jurisdiction whose data protection law is not as protective of individuals as UK data protection law, we will ensure that the recipient of your personal data is engaged on the basis of contractual terms which place them under obligations whose effect is that the organisation must handle your personal data in line with UK data protection law standards
9 How long do we keep your personal data?
We will retain your personal data only for as long as necessary for each purpose we use it. In some instances, we are obliged by law to keep it for a defined period (for example, we keep all financial transaction for seven years as outlined by the Companies Act 2006). At the end of specified retention periods we will dispose of your data securely.
10 Your individual rights
Data protection law gives you a number of rights which you can exercise as against ETF. Please note that, while some of these rights apply broadly, some of them are only available to exercise in certain specific circumstances. Your rights are as follows:
- Right to access your personal data. You can ask us for a copy of the personal data we hold (this is often called a “subject access request”). There are some exemptions to the right of access which mean you may not always be entitled to a copy of all of your personal data that we hold.
- Right to have your data rectified if you think it is wrong or to complete information if you think it’s incomplete.
- Right to have your data erased from our systems and records in certain circumstances. The right to object to certain uses which we may make of your personal data in certain circumstances and the right to ask us to restrict, stop or change how we are using your personal data pending resolution of a dispute or the answer to a query.
- Right to have processing of your personal data carried out on a restricted basis in certain circumstances.
- Right to withdraw your consent to the processing of your personal data, if we are processing it on the basis of your consent. In this vein, you can unsubscribe from marketing and communications from us at any time by using the unsubscribe link in ETF emails or by contacting us at: communications@etfoundation.co.uk.
- Right to data portability which allows you to request that we transfer your personal data to you or another third party in a commonly used, machine-readable format. Please note, this right only applies to automated information that you initially provided consent for us to use or where we used the information to perform a contract with you.
- Right to object to decisions being made solely by automated means (i.e. without any human involvement or input).
If you would like to know more about your rights under the data protection law see the Information Commissioner’s Office website.
11 Contacting us
11.1 You can withdraw consent from receiving regular information and communications from ETF by either emailing communications@etfoundation.co.uk with ‘unsubscribe’ in the subject header or by pressing the unsubscribe option at the bottom of any communications.
11.2 You can change the way you hear from us or withdraw your permission for us processing your personal data by contacting dataprotection@etfoundation.co.uk.
11.3 You can access your personal data by either downloading, completing and returning completing a Subject Access Request Form or writing to dataprotection@etfoundation.co.uk.
11.4 For any other queries relating to the processing of your personal data, or to contact ETF’s Data Protection Officer, you can:
email us at: dataprotection@etfoundation.co.uk
write to us at:
Education Training Foundation
3rd Floor, 157-197 Buckingham Palace Road
London SW1W 9SP.
or call us on: 0800 083 1830.
11.5 If you have a complaint about the way we have dealt with your personal data, you can write to us at complaints@etfoundation.co.uk or contact the UK regulator, the Information Commissioner’s Office, if you feel we are not acting fairly. Our full complaints procedures can be found in the ETF Complaints Policy.
12 Links to other sites
Our website may contain links to other websites. We do not have any control over the content or security of other websites and cannot be responsible for your privacy and protection if you choose to visit these websites.
Last updated 26 March 2026