Student Experience and Opinion Panel Privacy Notice
The University of Westminster takes its data protection obligations very seriously. Access to any personal information and contact information, as provided on the recruitment form is limited by permissions to only those staff who need to access and manage the Student Experience and Opinion Panel and is in compliance with the General Data Protection Regulation and the Data Protection Act 2018.
This privacy notice explains what we do with your personal information, your rights and how we protect your data. Your personal and contact data is requested when registering to be part of the panel.
The Student Experience and Opinion Panel is not in any way linked to your Student Record, therefore, you may be asked for some information which you have already provided to the University during your enrolment. No attempt will be made to link your Student Records data with your Student Experience and Opinion Panel registration.
The online registration form asks for the following personal information about you:
- Personal information - The sign-up form collects personal information such as your name and demographic information.
- Contact information - The sign-up form will ask for some contact information such as your university email address. If you opt-in to receive notifications via text-message or other messaging media we will collect your mobile phone number or relevant contact details.
We use your contact information to:
- Invite you to research opportunities
- Organise your attendance in research opportunities
- Notify you if you have won in a prize draw or to send you incentives that you have earned if we are unable to provide you with incentives face-to-face
- Get in touch with you if we change the terms of the Student Experience and Opinion Panel
We use your personal information to help us:
- Find the people who are most suitable for each research opportunity
- Reduce the number of questions we need to ask in surveys, and also to help us reduce the amount of times we need to ask for personal information within the survey questions
- Conduct further analysis on research data we have already collected (e.g. ‘80% of part-time Undergraduate students in our survey stated they commuted for 60 minutes or more per day, compared to 50% of full-time Undergraduate students’)
Who sees your information?
The Student Experience and Opinion Panel is managed by the Institutional Research Team. Each member of this team acts as a Panel Manager alongside a small number of authorised staff at the university (from within the Strategy, Performance and Planning Department will have access to your personal information and contact information, as provided on the recruitment form.
In research reports, some personal information may be used if it is deemed to be relevant. Your name and contact information will never be used in any reports. Reports will remain within the University and will not be published elsewhere.
Your personal information and contact information will not be shared with any third party.
Retaining your data
The personal data we collect via the methods described above will be stored on password protected internal University of Westminster drives. These are accessible only by University of Westminster colleagues and are housed within the European Economic Area.
Students can opt-out of the panel at any point by contacting: [email protected]. All your contact information will be deleted should you choose to opt-out of the Student Experience and Opinion Panel.
Personal information will be retained for the duration that you are a panelist on the Student Experience and Opinion Panel.
How will we use the data?
All data use is strictly within the terms of the Data Protection Act (DPA 2018).
We may include anonymised quotes as part of our reporting, however any information that could lead to the identification of an individual will be not disclosed. Your personal details will only be accessed by the research team on the Student Experience and Opinion Panel and will not be passed on to anyone else.
Anonymised data, such as anonymised survey responses or anonymised focus group transcripts, will be securely held for four years. If you withdraw from participation from the Student Experience and Opinion Panel, we may be unable to remove responses from ongoing or previous research that have already been anonymised and included in analysis.
Terms and conditions of the Student Experience and Opinion Panel
In this academic year, you may be asked to participate in a range of research which may include quick polls, online surveys and focus groups. Invitation to take part is likely to be sent via email. We would be grateful if you could read and complete any information with honesty and by the deadline provided.
Participation is on a voluntary basis, there is no obligation to take part in every survey, focus group or quick-poll or any other form of research. You can withdraw your personally recognisable responses at any point by contacting [email protected].
The Panel Manager may wish to audio record face-to-face or focus groups, workshops and other forms of research. Where audio recording takes place, your written permission will always be sought.
Where there is a prize draw, only one entry per participant will be counted towards the prize draw. Winners of prize draws will be determined by a random draw from all eligible entries and notified by email within 10 working days of the surveys closing date. Winners will have 7 days from notification to accept the prize by replying to the notification email.
Incentives for taking part in research (such as in-person or online focus groups) will be given to those who attend, and will be distributed to participants at the end of the focus group session. At the end of the session, you will be asked to sign a document confirming that you have received the incentive. Incentives will be delivered only by direct bank transfer or via receipt of an e-voucher to your University of Westminster student email address.
Unless specifically stated, all responses will remain anonymous and you will not be personally identifiable. However, personal information such as your age may be included in a report if this information is relevant. No personal information or contact information will be shared with third parties.
If at any time you would like to leave the Student Experience and Opinion Panel please email [email protected]. Your contact details will then be removed from the Student Experience and Opinion Panel (including removal from the Facebook group) and you will not be contacted to take part in any further research with the Student Experience and Opinion Panel.
The Institutional Research Team may remove panellists from the panel if the panellist is a repeated no-show at face-to-face or online research without prior notice of cancellation. Repeated is defined as three times in an academic year, and prior notice of cancellation is defined as giving notice at least 24 hours prior to the session.If a panellist is not interacting in a respectful way with fellow panellists during research,the Institutional Research Team withholds the right to remove them from the research session and will review their involvement in subsequent sessions.
If you have any questions regarding the contents of this Privacy Notice, please contact [email protected]
This statement was last reviewed and updated in August 2023.