Privacy notice for applicants

What information does the university collect?

Information held about you may include:

• Your name, contact information such as address, email address and telephone number, as well as your date of birth, country of domicile and your nationality. If you are an overseas student, we also collect information about your passport and visa.
• Information relating to your education and employment history, the school(s), high school college(s) and other colleges or universities you have attended and places where you have worked, the courses you have completed, dates of study and examination results.
• Information used to contact you or your next of kin in case of an emergency.
• Information about your family or personal circumstances, and both academic and extracurricular interests, for example where this is relevant to the assessment of your suitability to receive a scholarship.
• Financial information collected for the purposes of administering fees and charges, loans, grants, studentships and financial support.

The university also needs to collect and process personal ‘special categories of data’ under the GDPR including:

• your health and disabilities, to provide support and enable access to university services and to determine course suitability
• gender preference
• previous criminal convictions, before a place can be offered on certain programmes.

Why do we collect your data?

We collect and process your information in order to process your application, assess your suitability to attend one of our courses, and communicate with you about decisions on your application, and about preparing for university.

We also have a duty to report to statutory authorities on data such as the qualifications our applicants enter university with.

We may collect your personal data in a number of ways, for example:

• When you apply to study with us and complete application forms through national systems (such as Nuffic Neso), an international recruitment agent or feeder college or school or when you complete other admissions processes and procedures.
• From third parties, for example from your previous or current school, college, university or employers who may provide a reference about you or who may sponsor your studies.

How your data is held?

Your personal data is held within our university records database and accessed by staff within the admissions department in Registrar's Office and the Admissions Office and by admissions staff within the academic school.

All data relating to applicants is held within the EEA and will not be transferred outside of the EEA.

Who has access to data?

The university may share your data with a number of internal departments as part of the normal processing of your application. This may include:

• If you tell us about a disability, this information is shared with the process tutor team and Graduation & Examination Board, who contact you to find out about your support needs.
• If you are an international applicant we will share data with our international student support team so they can invite you to additional events/activities during the enrolment period.
• If you have applied for a place in university managed student housing / accommodation we may share data about the status of your application with the accommodation services.

The university may disclose certain personal information to external organisations to carry out our legal responsibilities, functions and manage our operations or because you asked us to. These may include:

• Dutch Ministry of Education Inspectorate
• Netherlands Accreditation Agency NVAO
• Other accreditation agencies such as FIBAA, AMBA, AACSB
• Immigration and Naturalisation Service (Interior Ministry, Ministry of Justice and Relevant government departments)
• Relevant professional or statutory regulatory bodies and other course accrediting organisations
• Local authorities to administer council tax and for electoral registration
• Health trusts or private companies contracted to provide occupational health assessments
• The police and other law enforcement agencies
• Auditors
• Your sponsors, where a contract exists
• The providers of any external learning or training placements
• Library services, including access to online resources and dyslexia support
• Third parties who work with us to provide student accommodation
• Your parents/guardian if you are under 18 years old.

For WUAS students also applying for joint delivered courses with the University of Brighton this may include:

• The University of Brighton 
• UK Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA)
• Relevant UK government departments (eg Home Office, including UK Visas and Immigration, UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office, UK Department of Health. UK Department of Education)
• UK Office for Students (OFS)
• UK Universities and Colleges Admissions Service (UCAS)
• UK Office for Fair Access (OFFA)
• UK Office of the Independent Adjudicator (OIA)
• UK Student Loans Company (SLC)

We will not normally disclose any other personal information about you to other external organisations without your consent unless it is in your vital interests to do so (for example an emergency situation).

How does the university protect data?

The university takes the security of your data seriously. It has 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 our employees in the proper performance of their duties.

How long we will keep your data?

The university keeps personal data for as long as it is needed for the purpose for which it was originally collected. We will normally keep applicant data for one year after the end of the recruitment cycle in which you applied, though if you become a student your data will be kept according to the Student Registrar Retention Schedule (pdf).