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Who we are
The University of East Anglia (UEA) is a public research university based in Norwich, England. UEA is a registered data controller of your information, which means we collect, use and store personal information about you as UEA applicants and enrolled students.
We do our utmost to protect your privacy. We have security systems and procedures to protect information from unauthorised disclosure, misuse, or destruction.
What information we collect about you
During your involvement with UEA, the following categories of personal information is collected, used, and stored securely by us:
Identifying Data – information that identifies you including your gender, image, voice, national insurance number, country of domicile, passport and visa.
Educational/Professional Data – information about your education and career.
University Life – information about your university life from application through to graduation, including disciplinary matters and breaches of regulations, policies and procedures; the provision of advice, support, and welfare; audio and video recordings of teaching sessions; and the prevention and detection of crime, including CCTV.
Location Data – information about your access to, engagement with and use of UEA’s facilities and services
Your Preferences – information about how you like to be contacted and what you would like to receive
Contact Data – information used to contact you or your named emergency contact
Social Data – information about your family or personal circumstances, and academic and extracurricular interests
Financial Data – information to enable the assessment and administration of fees and charges, loans, grants, studentships, financial support etc.
Criminal Data – criminal convictions or cautions
Sensitive Information – information that is more sensitive and includes details about your race and ethnicity, sexual orientation, religious beliefs, trade union memberships, political opinions, or health e.g. your accessibility needs or disabilities.
How and when we collect this information
UEA will collect information about you during the application, admission, and registration processes. The information will come directly from you or from a third party, e.g. UCAS.
We will continue to collect information from you throughout your time at UEA e.g. as a consequence of your access to, engagement with and use of UEA and UEA Student Union (SU) facilities and services, and will also generate information about you which will become your personal information.
Why we collect and how we use this information
We will only use your personal data for the purposes for which we collected it, unless we consider that we need to use it for another related reason and that reason is compatible with the original purpose. If we need to use your data for an unrelated purpose, we will seek your consent to use it for that new purpose.
UEA collects personal information from you to perform its public tasks as a provider of higher education and research and uses it:
For all administration relating to your studies and research, from application and enrolment, through to graduation.
This includes, but is not limited to:
Your attendance, progress, course work, lectures, use of facilities and services, placements, assessments, examinations, invigilation, trips, visits, and participation at events, (any of which may be recorded using technology) the provision of academic transcripts and award certificates
All administration relating to the financial aspects or your relationship with UEA and any related funders, including the administration of fees and charges, loans, grants, studentships, bursaries, scholarships, and hardship funds
The assessment and administration of tasks around student employability, industry, and employer engagement; the sharing of fitness to practice information or qualifications with relevant bodies or your progression data with partners involved in joint course provision
The administration and conduct of appeals, complaints, suspensions, investigations, and disciplinary proceedings into non-academic, academic, or professional conduct
To administer exams or coursework concessions as permitted in the criteria for extenuating circumstances
The use of learning and predictive analytics, to improve our services, facilities, assess the outcomes of surveys and to participate in national and sectoral benchmarking activities
The administration between UEA and SU clubs, societies, members, volunteers, academic and student representatives, SU elections and student engagement.
UEA collects personal information from you to comply with the law and uses it:
To share with the Higher Education Statistics Authority (HESA)*, Ofsted, professional bodies, government agencies, auditors, assessors, or other external regulators to enable them to conduct their statutory functions
To fulfil our legal duties under safeguarding and Prevent laws or where a potential public health risk is identified
To produce analysis, reports and statistics to help us understand our student population or record information relating to disabilities to make sure we can make reasonable adjustments or ensure our policies and procedures do not disadvantage minority groups, or when we record and report on incidents and accidents in compliance with health and safety laws
To assist UK agencies with their duties such as the prevention and detection of crime, apprehension and prosecution of offenders, or the collection of a tax or other levy. In addition, for certain courses we may use your information for the purposes of Disclosure and Barring (DBS) checking
To share confirmation of study details with the local council to enable it to assess and collect Council Tax or with the Home Office/UKVI for visa purposes.
* please note the link above will take you to HESA's external website.
UEA collects personal information from you for its or your legitimate interests:
To enable you to register with the Sportspark, improve our services, protect our property or investigate technical issues. This may include using your personal information, to ensure the security, health, safety, and well-being of our students, staff, and other campus users, and to protect UEA’s property. This may include monitoring the use of/access to specific facilities and premises
To contact you or your emergency contact, your GP or to share information with University Medical Service
To share with and enable the local Electoral Registration Officer to encourage eligible students to register to vote
To share with the SU to enable participation in activities, including voting
To review student opinion and satisfaction with services provided by UEA
For Occupational Health Assessments (where relevant to your course) or
Recording your research activities.
UEA may use your information:
To allocate and administer your student residence where you have made a contract
To share your attendance and progress reports with sponsors where a contract exists, although if there is no contract in place, we will ask for your consent
To confirm qualifications
In a medical emergency, which may include sharing your personal information with the emergency services, security, accommodation services and welfare teams if there is significant and credible evidence to suggest that you, or someone else may be in danger or
When you have freely given your informed, specific consent. An example may be where you have given consent to discuss your circumstances with a representative or family member or where you choose to receive certain types of communications from us, or where your consent has been taken for certain confidential counselling, advice, therapy, assessment or support services provided by third parties. It is important to note that you have the right to withdraw this consent at any time.
Sensitive Information
Access to and the sharing of this kind of ‘special category’ personal information has extra protection. Where we do use your sensitive personal information, we will either have obtained your explicit consent or there will be a substantial public interest reason with a basis in law.
The reasons for using this information include to prevent or detect unlawful acts, to protect the public, or to address safeguarding issues. It may also include the monitoring of disability data to facilitate access to buildings; information about race and ethnicity for monitoring our responsibilities under the Equality Act 2010; medical information required to provide learning support. Other reasons to use this information would be for employment, social security, and social protection purposes (such as public health issues, accidents or occupational health etc).
Who we may share your information with
UEA may share your information with other UEA departments or external organisations either where there is a legitimate or legal reason to do so or because you asked us to.
These external organisations include:
Statutory, Regulatory & Government bodies
JISC/Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA)*, the Home Office, UK Visas and Immigration, Foreign and Commonwealth Office, Department of Health, Department of Education, HM Revenue and Customs, Health & Safety Executive, Office for Students (OFS), Universities and Colleges Admissions Service (UCAS), Office of the Independent Adjudicator (OIA), Student Loans Company (SLC), funding bodies, relevant professional or statutory regulatory bodies and other course accrediting organisations, local authorities, the police, and other law enforcement agencies
* please note the link above will take you to HESA's external website.
Organisations running student experience surveys
The Student Experience Survey (SES), National Student Survey (NSS), the Postgraduate Taught Experience Survey (PTES), the Postgraduate Research Experience Survey (PRES) and the Destinations of Leavers from Higher Education survey (DLHE)
Third party providers of goods or services
Software providers, insurers, auditors, placement/exchange/trip providers, library services, student support services (e.g. Assessment of Need reporting, dyslexia support/testing, counselling), external supervisors and examiners, event hosts e.g. graduation providers, participants in events linked to your course, accommodation providers, banks, employers, debt collection agencies, research & statistical providers
Other
UEA SU
Educational and research partners, funders and donors
INTO University Partnership Limited & INTO UEA LLP
Emergency contact, parent/carer (if under 18).
The Commonwealth Scholarship Commission in the UK (CSC)
We will not normally disclose your personal information to other external organisations without your consent unless it is in the event of a medical emergency.
Where UEA shares your information with any organisation based outside the UK, appropriate safeguards will be in place to protect your personal information.
How long we keep your information
We will keep your personal information only as long as it is necessary for the purpose it was collected and in accordance with UEA’s records retention schedule. This means that, in normal circumstances, your full data will be kept for six years after you have left UEA. After this time, we will retain a basic core record of your personal information. This is detailed in the Alumni Privacy Notice.
UEA will always store your personal information safely and will never disclose it to any other person unlawfully.
Your rights
Under data protection law, you have rights including:
Right of access – you can ask us for copies of your personal information (this is known as a Data Subject Access Request or SAR)
Right to rectification – you can ask us to rectify personal information you think is inaccurate
Right to erasure - you can ask us to erase your personal information
Right to restrict processing – you can ask us to restrict how we use your personal information
Right to object to processing – you can object to us using your personal information
Right to data portability – you can ask that we transfer the personal information you gave us to another organisation, or to you.
Please note, these rights are not absolute and the requirement for UEA to comply with your request depends on the purpose for our processing. You do not need to pay any charge for exercising these rights. If you make a request, we have one month to respond to you.
How to contact us
Please contact UEA’s Data Protection Officer at dataprotection@uea.ac.uk if you would like any further information; if you wish to exercise any of your data rights; if you believe your personal information has been breached; or if you have any other concerns about how your personal information is being used by UEA.
If you are still not happy after you have spoken to us, you can contact the ICO:
Online - Contact us - public | ICO or by phone - ICO Helpline number: 0303 123 1113
Changes to this privacy notice
We keep our privacy notices under regular review.
This privacy notice was last updated on 15 January 2025