Complaints and Compliments Procedure
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Fair Processing Notice – Schools with Primary Age Pupils – Layer One Academic Year 2007/2008
Notice Provided by the Department for Children, Schools & Families
Horton St Michael’s First School processes personal data about its pupils and is a “data controller” in respect of this for the purposes of the Data Protection Act 1998. It processes this data to:
This data includes contact details, national curriculum assessment results, attendance information, characteristics such as ethnic group, special educational needs and any relevant medical information.
This data may only be used or passed on for specific purposes allowed by law. From time to time the school is required to pass on some of this data to local authorities, the Department for Children, Schools and Families (DCSF), and to agencies that are prescribed by law, such as the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority (QCA), Ofsted, the Learning and Skills Council (LSC), the Department of Health (DH), Primary Care Trusts (PCT), All these are data controllers in respect of the data they receive, and are subject to the same legal constraints in how they deal with the data.
The Fair Processing Notice has been prepared at a time of change with the restructuring of the Department for Education and Skills and the Department of Trade and Industry into three new Departments: the Department for Children, Schools and Families (DCSF), the Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills (DIUS) and the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulator Reform (DBERR). It may be that, [during the period covered by this FPN], steps will be taken to enable the DCSF to match individual pupil information with higher and further education attainment data held by the DIUS.
Pupils, as data subjects, have certain rights under the Data Protection Act, including a general right to be given access to personal data held about them by any data controller. The presumption is that by the age of 12 a child has sufficient maturity to understand their rights and to make an access request themselves if they wish. A parent would normally be expected to make a request on a child’s behalf if the child is younger.
If you wish to access your personal data, or that of your child, then please contact the School Office in writing.
Your attention is drawn to (Layer 2) of this Fair Processing Notice, which gives supplementary information about the processing of pupil data by the organisations mentioned above, and to the Full Notice (Layer 3) which gives greater details of how the pupil data is processed and the rights of parents and pupils. Either can be obtained by contacting the school office.
Home-School-Child Agreement
Horton, St Michael’s First School aims to provide a happy secure environment within a Christian ethos for all our children. They are encouraged to value themselves and respect others and to develop into responsible and confident members of society.
Our School will:
1. Care for your child’s safety and happiness.
2. Provide a flexible relevant balanced curriculum that meets the needs of all our children.
Parents are asked to:
Together we will:
Headteacher’s signature
Parent’s signature
Complaints and Compliments Procedure
The school welcomes feedback and parents can talk to staff informally at anytime. The formal complaints procedure is set out below. Compliments and complaints can be recorded on the form downloadable from this link: Complaints & Compliments Form
Introduction
The main purpose of a complaints procedure is to solve problems and to give parents a means to raise issues of concern and have them addressed. Complainants should be treated respectfully during and after the course of any complaints investigation.
All members of staff should be aware of the complaints procedure and understand:
Expressing Concerns
At this informal stage the school should consider the best way of dealing with the concerns raised according to the circumstances. It is preferable for all concerned that concerns are resolved now rather than later.
Formal Complaints
Stage 1 - The Headteacher
It may be that the headteacher has not been aware of the concern raised prior to this point. At this stage the Headteacher should consider whether the complainant can be satisfied without recourse to the governing body.
The response to the parent should be as described in the paragraph "outcomes" below.
Action through a complaints procedure may lead to action being initiated under other procedures. This may be disciplinary or child protection procedures and consideration should be given to this possibility at the earliest stage. In these cases the investigations under the complaints procedure will be suspended until action under the other procedures (including appeals) has been concluded. The complainant should be advised if this is the case and also informed of the likely delay in the final resolution of their complaint.
Stage 2 - Formal Complaint to the Governing Body
Where complaints cannot be resolved informally each school should have a procedure for accepting complaints made to the Chair of the Governing Body. Complaints should be accepted in writing or verbally. Where a complaint is accepted verbally it should be reported back to the complainant to ensure that details have been collected correctly. The complaints and compliments form (downloadable from the top of this section) can be used to record the details of a complaint.
The school should record when the complaint is received. A complaint should then be acknowledged in writing by, or on behalf of, the Chair of the Governing Body. The acknowledgement should include an explanation of what will happen next, time scales involved and the name of the person from whom they will next hear about the progress of the investigation.
Details of a complaint should be kept confidential expect in so far as they need to be shared with people who might contribute to their resolution.
The Role of the Chair of Governors
The Chair of Governors will need to consider whether the investigation can be completed by the Headteacher (who will already have been involved), the Chair him/herself, or whether to refer the complaint to a Complaints Committee of the Governing Body. If the latter course of action is followed the chair shall present a full report to the Committee and, if necessary, external advice may be sought from the District Education Officer.
It would be appropriate for this committee to be made up of three Governors. The membership should not include the Headteacher and, according to the matter complained about, it may not be appropriate for certain categories of Governor to be included.
The Committee should meet at a time convenient to the members of the Committee, the Chair (who will present the report), the parent (in order that they may make representations in person) and any witnesses.
Outcomes
In all cases where a complaint has been investigated the complainant will be given a written response covering:
The Committee may wish to offer the complainant the opportunity to discuss the response.
If the investigation upholds the complaint , redress should be appropriate to the complaint and may include:
Each school will take responsibility for:
Where a complaint is not upheld the complainant must be given a response and informed of any further action that might be appropriate in their situation.
Stages 3 and 4 - The role of the LEA
Parents do not have a general right of appeal should they disagree with the Governors' decision. They may, however, raise the matter with the Local Education Authority or Secretary of State if they consider the complaint wasn't investigated properly and fairly. If the Governors have followed a proper procedure and considered the complaint reasonably, neither the Local Education Authority nor the Secretary of State can reverse their decision.
Agreed by Governors: 9 th October 2006
