UniFest
Application
Information

Before you complete the UniFest Application Form please read all of the UniFest information on our website aimhigherwm.ac.uk/unifest.

The form is divided into 4 sections:

Section 1 – Young Person Details (to be completed by the applicant/student)

Section 2 – UniFest Choices (to be completed by the applicant/student)

Section 3 – Parent/Carer Details (to be completed by parents/carers)

Section 4 – Consent (to be completed by parents/carers and the applicant/student)

To take part in UniFest, the data provided on the form (or subsequent correspondence) needs to be shared with Aimhigher universities* and the school you/your child attends.

We will NOT be asking for your permission:

• to process your personal data for programme monitoring purposes. This includes data provided by you or your school/college to see if learners are eligible to take part within Aimhigher activities; and data collected by Aimhigher staff to monitor and evaluate your engagement within Aimhigher activities. We do not require your consent to process this data, as we do this in the public interest to meet our conditions of funding and statutory obligations. This data will be shared with you/ your child’s school or college and Aimhigher partner organisations.

More information about how Aimhigher processes personal data about those taking part in our activities and research can be found within our Privacy Notice on our website (https://aimhigher.wpengine.com/about-us/gdpr/) and we recommend that you read this. This explains how and why we use personal data, who data is shared with, how long we keep it, what your rights are and how to raise any queries or concerns. If you have any difficulties in accessing our website or need it in another format, please contact aimhigher@contacts.bham.ac.uk

We will ask for your permission:

• for you (the young person) / your child to take part in research (as detailed below) as part of the Aimhigher Programme based at the University of Birmingham
• to match your (the young person) / your child’s data obtained from those educational organisations listed (i.e. your exam results and what you do after leaving school or college) with information we hold about your/your child’s involvement in Aimhigher.

We are carrying out research into how Aimhigher activities raise aspirations, attainment and entry to higher education. With your permission the data on this form will also be shared with other organisations** so that we can match data on this form with their records and subsequent data we collect (e.g. evaluation forms), to help us support more young people in the future. Participating in this research is voluntary, and you have the right not to participate or to leave the study at any time*** without affecting your relationship with Aimhigher or Aimhigher universities. Any information we publish will not identify you without your permission. The data you provide will be retained securely until the student is 25 years old, after which it will be destroyed. If you have any questions about this research please contact Aimhigher (aimhigher@contacts.bham.ac.uk).

To do this research, we need to match data relating to each child about their involvement in Aimhigher (which we hold) with data about their exam results and information about what they do after they leave school or college (which is provided to us by other organisations). The organisations which provide us with that data include: your school/college, the Aimhigher universities and national learner data sets including Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA), University Central Admissions Service (UCAS), the Student Loans Company (SLC), the National Pupil Database (NPD) and we may also ask for college/further education data from the Individual Learner Record (ILR). We obtain data from those organisations by sending them details about young people who are taking part in Aimhigher activities. The personal data that we send them includes name, date of birth, year group home postcode and school/college. These organisations then provide us with information from their records. We then match it with the data we hold about each individual. We may also share such data (and records of your engagement in Aimhigher activities) with the Office for Students (our funders) so that they can see if the programme is benefiting learners.

However, we will not do this unless we have your permission to do so.

Taking part in this research is voluntary, and you have the right not to take part or to leave the study at any time without affecting your relationship with Aimhigher or Aimhigher universities. If you decide to leave the research study, we will retain data collected to that point to produce anonymised, aggregated reports to identify and quantify your involvement in the Aimhigher programme.

*Aimhigher universities are: Aston University, Birmingham City University, Newman University, University College Birmingham, the University of Worcester and the University of Birmingham. **The organisations we would share data with are: your school, your local authority, the National Pupil Database, UCAS, the Higher Education Statistics Agency, the Student Loans Company, the Higher Education Access Tracker (HEAT) and the Office for Students). ***If you decide to leave the study, we will retain data collected to that point to produce anonymised, aggregated reports and to identify and quantify your involvement in the Aimhigher programme. If you have any concerns about the data held about you or your family you can make a complaint to the Information Commissioner’s Office by calling 0303 123 1113.