Your privacy and VicSRC
Privacy Statement
VicSRC collects your personal information where reasonably necessary to conduct one or more of our activities or services.
We will explain the purpose at the time we collect the information or as soon as practicable afterwards.
Reasons for collection include to:
Verify your identity
Process your VicSRC membership or partnership application
Register your attendance at an event/workshop or for reimbursement of expenditure. This could include your contact details and financial information such as credit card or bank account details
Send you information regarding the VicSRC advocacy and related activities. We may also send you information regarding upcoming events, forums or training activities.
Perform assessment against eligibility criteria for scholarship applications
Improve our services, for instance via the collection of information about how members respond to our emails and how many take action through our website.
Personal information will not be used for any other purpose without your consent, unless VicSRC is required by law to disclose that information.
VicSRC complies with all relevant privacy legislation. Only authorised VicSRC personnel are provided with access to personal information.
VicSRC will take all reasonable steps to protect against the loss, misuse and/or alteration of the information under its control including through appropriate physical and electronic security strategies.
If you believe the information we hold is inaccurate or out of date, contact VicSRC and we will update the relevant information accordingly.
Privacy concerns
If you wish to make an enquiry or complaint about your personal information at VicSRC please email [email protected] .
Every effort will be made to resolve the issue quickly and effectively.
Privacy Policy
This privacy policy outlines how we obtain information from you and what we do with it when you use the VicSRC website and as a VicSRC member.
This website is owned and operated by the Victorian Student Representative Council (VicSRC).
In order to keep up with changing legislation and best practice, we may revise this privacy policy any time without notice. We will post any changes to this Privacy Policy on our website, so we encourage you to check this Privacy Policy from time to time.
Information We Collect
We may collect personal information and/or sensitive information in the course of our activities and functions in managing and operating the Site, namely, when:
When you become a member of the VicSRC an account is created for you and all the activities you engage in through the VicSRC are linked to your account. Below we've detailed the information we collect about you depending on how you use the VicSRC, and how we obtain this information.
We collect your personal information directly from you unless impracticable or unreasonable to do so.
Information we collect includes:
Your name: We require you to provide your name when you become a member of the VicSRC.
Your email address: We require you to provide an email address when you become a member of the VicSRC.
Your postcode: We require you to provide your postcode when you become a member of the Site.
Your date of birth: We require you to provide your date of birth when you become a member of the VicSRC to ensure you are school aged.
The school you attend: We require you to provide the name of the school you attend or work at when you become a member of the VicSRC to ensure you are a student.
The year you are currently enrolled in at school: We require you to provide the year you are currently enrolled in at school when you become a member of the VicSRC.
Aboriginal or Torres Strait islander origin: It is optional for you to provide us with this information when you become a member of the VicSRC.
Your school leadership activities: We require you to provide the details of your school leadership activities when you become a member of the VicSRC.
The area of your school: We require you to provide the area of your school when you become a member of the VicSRC.
The school level you are currently enrolled in: We require you to provide the level of schooling to become a member of the VicSRC.
The sector your school belongs to: We require you to provide the sector of your school.
Any other information you voluntarily submit: The VicSRC provides other opportunities to share information to us. For example, we may collect information when you respond to surveys or questionnaires. Providing this information is optional.
Passive information Collection
Passive information we collect includes:
Your IP address. Your IP address is a designator that is automatically assigned to the computer that you are using by your Internet Service Provider (ISP): An IP address may be identified and logged automatically in our server log files whenever you use the Site, along with the time of your visit and the specific page(s) that you visited.
The name of the browser you use to access studentvoicehub.org.au: Certain information is collected by most browsers or automatically through your device. This includes your computer type, operating system and internet browser type and version. Collecting this information helps us to deliver the best possible version of the Site to you.
Navigational Data: As you navigate through the Site, certain information including pages visited and pathways will be recorded.
Information inferred about the topics you care about based on your activities on the Site: If you download certain resources, we may infer that you could be interested in other resources that are categorised in the same way. We may also send you suggestions that are relevant to your age or geographic area.
Information collected through cookies: The Site makes use of cookies. Cookies are a technology which can be used to provide you with tailored information from a web site. Cookies are used for the following purposes:
Site administration
Completing the user's current activity
Sensitive information
We collect sensitive information from you when:
You choose to provide information regarding whether you are of Aboriginal or Torres Strait islander origin when you become a member of the VicSRC;
You voluntarily submit to us sensitive information when you respond to, for example, polls or questionnaires via the VicSRC;
Where you choose to provide such sensitive information to us in the course of interacting with the VicSRC.
We will only collect sensitive information about you if you consent to our collection. All sensitive information is collected directly from you.
Where applicable, we will request your consent to collect this information when you create a new member account for use of the VicSRC.
Children
Personal information will not be collected by any person who is known by us to be under the age of fifteen (15) years old without guardian consent. Persons under fifteen (15) will require guardian consent before becoming a VicSRC member.
How We Use Your Information
The purposes for which we collect, hold, use and disclose personal information are outlined below.
Purpose: The Site is a child safe organisation. We use the information you provide us with to keep you safe.
Example: For fraud and security monitoring purposes, for example, to detect and prevent cyber-attacks or attempts to commit identity theft.
Purpose: For business purposes
Example: For data analysis to improve the efficiency of our services. For audits to verify that our internal processes are functioning as intended and compliant with legal, regulatory or contractual requirements. For developing new features and services.
Purpose: To communicate with you via emails, notifications or other messages, consistent with any permissions you have communicated to us
Example: To send you updates or changes to our privacy policy and terms of use. To send you information about the VicSRC activities.
Purpose: To share communications from external organisations we believe may be of interest to you.
Example: To send you information from our partner organisations or other organisations that share our purpose and values.
Ability of Others to View Information
Legal Requirements
We may share your information with third parties, including law enforcement, public or governmental agencies or private litigants, if we determine that such disclosure is reasonably necessary to comply with the law.
We may also retain, preserve or disclose your information if we determine that disclosure is reasonably necessary or appropriate to prevent any person from harm, to address issues of national security or other issues of public importance, to prevent or detect violations of our Terms of Service or fraud or abuse of staff that operate and manage the VicSRC or members of the VicSRC.
Storage and Security of Personal Information
We will endeavour to take all reasonable steps to keep secure any personal information recorded, and to keep this information accurate, up to date, complete and relevant. We implement appropriate technical and organisational measures to help protect the security of your personal data.
Unfortunately, no data transmission or storage system can be guaranteed to be 100% secure. If you have reason to believe that your interaction with us is no longer secure or you feel that the security of any account you have with us may be compromised, please immediately notify us using the contact details listed at the end of this Privacy Policy.
If we become aware that there has been unauthorised access to or unauthorised disclosure of personal information, or loss of personal information, that is likely to result in serious harm to any of the individuals whose information is involved, and we are unable to take any remedial action that would make serious harm no longer likely, we will take steps to notify any relevant regulator and affected individuals to the extent that we are required to do so under applicable laws.
Third party disclosure
We use third party storage and/or hosting providers to assist us in our business functions and activities in operating and managing the Site. We may use these third parties to:
Store personal or sensitive information that we receive from you when you use the VicSRC website or register for membership;
Store personal or sensitive information that we receive from you when you complete surveys or polls on the VicSRC website;
We may disclose your personal information to overseas recipients or third parties where we rely on those recipients to store or host your personal information.
Information you provide us or which is collected by us is stored by and disclosed to third party data storage providers electronically and may be combined or linked to other information we or they hold about you.
Your personal information is not made available to external parties without your consent, save where set out above on the basis that its use or disclosure in those circumstances is directly related to the primary purpose for which we collect it.
Data Retention and Deletion
We will retain your personal information for as long as needed or permitted in light of the purposes for which it was obtained.
Personal information is deleted when an account is deleted. You have the ability to delete your own account at any time.
Accessing Your Personal Information
You have the right to access, review and correct your personal information that may be recorded on the database for the Site. Information may be reviewed by contacting us via the contact details listed below. Please allow 30 days for this request to be processed.
There may be instances where we are not required to provide you with access to your personal information. For example, if it interferes with the privacy of others, if the information relates to existing or anticipated legal proceedings, or if your request is vexatious, if the information is subject to confidentiality, or another permissible exception applies.
If we refuse your request for correction of or access to your personal information, you will be advised in writing of the grounds for refusal, and notified of available complaint mechanisms.
Complaints Resolution
We are committed to providing a fair and responsive system for handling and resolving complaints. You have the right to complain, and to have your complaint handled efficiently. We will attempt to respond to, and/or action, all complaints within 30 days of lodgment.
In order to process any request for access or correction of personal information, we may need to obtain a minimum level of information from an individual including full name, date of birth and details of the request evidencing the individual's right to access the data.
If you are seeking access to or correction of information on another person's behalf, we will also require written authorisation from that individual. We reserve the right to refuse access to personal information under the grounds permitted by the Privacy Act.
If at any time you wish to lodge a privacy complaint in respect of the handling, use or disclosure of their personal information by us, or make a request for access to or correction of your personal information, you can do so by submitting your complaint in writing, endorsed "Privacy", and addressing it to the contact details listed below.
If we receive a complaint from you about how we have handled your personal information, we will determine what (if any) action we should take to resolve the complaint. We will respond to your complaint within 30 days.
Policy Updates and Contacting Us
We may occasionally make changes to this policy.
When we make material changes to this policy, we will provide you with notice either via email or displaying a prominent notice on the VicSRC website.
Thank you for reading our Privacy Policy. If you have any questions about this Policy, please contact us using the following details:
Key Contact
Howard Choo, VicSRC Chair of the Board
[email protected]
0401 841 749
This policy was last updated in January, 2023