ICO PUBLISHES A GUIDANCE FOR TEACHERS AND SCHOOLS ON STUDENT’S ACCESS TO THEIR EXAM RESULTS

17.08.2020

Information Commissioner Office (“ICO”) has recently published a guidance for teachers and schools on student’s access to information about their exam results.

In the guidance three questions are responded with respect to students’ exam result and personal data protection. The questions herein are briefly as follows;

• Does the exam script exemption apply this year?

In this context, the exam script exemption will still apply to the information used to award students’ grades so that teachers do not have to provide a response to requests from students for information about their provisional grades, including the teacher assessments and/or rank orders, until after the results are published.

If a teacher receives a request from a student before the official results are announced then the exemption allows for longer response times. The timeframe for responding to these requests is either: within five months of receiving the request; or within 40 days of announcing the exam results, whichever date is earliest.

Requests made after the results are announced need to be dealt with as a normal subject access request.

• How does the exam script exemption apply this year - Does it mean that we don’t have to provide the teacher assessments/rank order information to students this year?

The exam script exemption does not exempt you from providing the teacher assessments and/or rank orders to students. However, if a teacher receives a request for this information before the official results are announced, he/she will have a longer time to respond to this request.

Additionally, the exam script exemption applies to information that has been recorded by the students themselves during an exam or assessment. Therefore, students do not have a right to get copies of their answers from mock exams or assignments used to assess their performance

After results are issued, and subject to data protection and any other relevant legal considerations, schools and colleges may choose to proactively provide students with their centre assessment grade and/or rank order information, regardless of whether they have received any subject access request(s).

• What if the information requested could reveal something about another individual?

When disclosing information, whether that be proactively or in response to a subject access request, an organisation needs to consider if the information they are providing would reveal something about another individual. If so, then teachers need to think about whether it would be reasonable to disclose it rather than withhold it.

You can read the announcement of the ICO here.

Should you have any queries and/or remarks, please do not hesitate to contact us. 

 

Kind regards,

Zumbul Attorneys-at-Law

info@zumbul.av.tr