This privacy notice is regularly reviewed and may be updated or revisited at any time. It was last updated in January 2026. It is important that the personal data we hold about you is accurate and current. Please keep us informed if your personal data changes.
- Introduction
- What personal data do we collect?
- How we use personal data
- Legal Basis for processing
- Who do we share personal data with?
- How long do we keep personal data?
- Automated decisions
- Your rights
- Data Protection Officer.
Introduction
Our core data protection obligations and commitments are set out in Wigan Council Primary Privacy Notice.
This notice provides additional privacy information for Schools Admissions and Appeals.
The School Organisation Team fulfils the Local Authority’s statutory duties as the admission authority for community and voluntary controlled schools, and as the coordinator for applications for its area. This includes the allocation of school places and ensuring applicants are offered the right of appeal when a school place is refused.
These services are also provided to schools that are their own admission authority, such as academies, voluntary controlled (church) schools and foundation schools. Services are provided to these schools through a service level agreement.
What personal data do we collect?
To carry out activities and obligations in relation to Schools Admissions and Appeals we process the following personal data:
- Name
- Address
- Telephone number
- Email address
- Date of birth
- Reasons for preferences expressed by parents/carers
- Siblings
- Looked after and previously looked after children status
- Previous school history
- Information submitted by parents / carers for their appeal
- Behaviour logs and reports
- Incident reports
- Pastoral information.
We also process the following special category data:
- Health information of the child/young person, including medical letters and reports, SEND and Education and Health Care Plan status, if applicable
- Race, ethnic origin, religion, sexual orientation, where relevant.
How we use personal data
The main purposes for processing your personal data are:
- To allow for co-ordination of application for school places
- To consider applicant details against the oversubscription criteria for a school
- To ascertain appropriate school place offer for children who are being allocated a place using the Fair Access Protocol
- To track pupils who may be at risk of being missing from education
- To allow consideration of your circumstances by an independent appeal panel, should the applicant take up their right to appeal.
Legal Basis for processing
The lawful bases we rely on for processing your personal data are:
- Compliance with a Legal Obligation.
The legal gateways include, but are not limited to
- School Admissions code 2021
- School Admission Appeals code 2022
- School Admissions (Admission Arrangements and Co-ordination of Admission Arrangements) (England) Regulations 2012.
The condition we rely on for processing your special category data and criminal offence data is:
- Reasons of substantial public interest (with a basis in law): Statutory etc and government purposes.
Who do we share personal data with?
In addition to the general reasons for data sharing described in the Council’s Primary Privacy Notice, we share data with and collect data from the following when required:
- Other Council teams including but not limited to Council Tax
- Other local authorities
- Educational establishments, including Schools, free schools, academies, independent schools, alternative education providers, Diocesan boards
- Health service providers, including GPs and school nurses
- Any persons or organisations exercising functions or engaging in activities in relation to children and adults within the Wigan Council area.
This is not an exhaustive list.
How long do we keep personal data?
We will only retain your personal data for as long as necessary to fulfil the purposes we collected it for, including for the purposes of satisfying any future legal, accounting, or reporting requirements.
We must continue to retain necessary data in accordance with our corporate records policy to fulfil legal, statutory and regulatory requirements.
Automated decisions
All the decisions we make about you involve human intervention.
Your rights
More information on how to seek advice to exercise your rights, raise a concern or complain about the handling of your personal data by the council can be found in at Wigan Council Primary Privacy Notice.
Data protection officer
If you wish to raise a concern or seek clarification about any aspect of this notice, please contact our Data Protection Officer. Please provide documents to prove your identity along with a description of your concern.
We will respond to all requests within one month.
If you are unhappy with the way that we handle your concern you may complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) (external link).
Document information
Owner: Cath Pealing, Assistant Director Education
Author: Emlyn Wright, Service Lead for Standards and Learning
Version and date: V3.0 January 2026