What information does Chisholm collect?

Chisholm Institute (“Chisholm”, “we”, “us”) collects your personal information during the student enquiry, application, enrolment and throughout your student journey with us.

We will mainly collect information directly from you. There may be circumstances where information may be provided on your behalf, for example, to verify you meet the requirements of the enrolment or course pre-requisites, such as from professional associations, training providers, medical practitioners or government agencies. We will only collect information from other sources with your consent or in accordance with the law.

We collect personal information about you:

  • in order to consider your application to enrol in one of our courses and
  • if you do enrol in one of our courses, to provide our educational and training services to you, to obtain payment from you for those services and to otherwise administer and manage our relationship with you.

Generally, the personal information that we collect from you and process to support your study at Chisholm includes:

  • your name
  • mailing or street address
  • email address, telephone number and other contact details
  • age or date of birth
  • details of your previous education and qualifications
  • fee payments, financial aid and scholarships information
  • citizenship and/or visa status
  • information about your academic progress and standing, assessments, results and details of practical placements and other workplace training (if applicable)
  • any assigned student numbers (unique identifiers)
  • Tax file numbers and financial institution information for the purpose of fees, refunds and financial support programs (if applicable)
  • Details of any disciplinary or conduct matters
  • Other information relevant to your enrolment and education to facilitate appropriate academic and student services.

We may also collect additional types of personal information about you as set out in our General Privacy Collection Statement from time to time. This includes collection of personal information indirectly from for specific purposes where direct collection is not practicable such as the collection of data from Chisholm’s learning management systems, library services and other relationship systems to enable us to carry out analytics for reporting purposes and to improve our student support and services provision.

When individuals access academic and non-academic facilities and services that we offer, Chisholm may also process personal information classed as sensitive or special category data (for example, when you access our student support services), which require additional protections under the law. For some courses of study, other types of sensitive information or special category data may also be processed by us, such as information about past criminal convictions, working with children or vulnerable adults, vaccination records and fitness to practise in certain regulated industries. Access to, and the sharing of, this type of information is carefully controlled, and it is processed in compliance with our legislative obligations. You will be given details about our collection and management of such information at the time that we collect it from you.

If you register for events, campus tours, newsletters or are a supporter of, or a volunteer at Chisholm we will hold the personal information provided by you during your interactions with us. You may also provide us with your personal information when you agree to participate in user experience research or provide other feedback. This is explained in the relevant privacy collection notices specific to those activities.

Where you provide Chisholm with the personal information of others (such as details of your emergency contacts) you are encouraged to inform those parties whose information you provide that:

  • you are disclosing that information to Chisholm and
  • the information will be retained in accordance with relevant Chisholm policies.

How do we keep your information secure?

Your personal information is created, stored and transmitted in a variety of paper and electronic formats. This include databases that are shared across Chisholm. Chisholm staff receive privacy and data protection training.

We take reasonable steps to ensure that any personal information we (or third parties operating on our behalf) collect, transmit, store or otherwise process, is accurate and complete, and that appropriate measures are implemented and maintained to protect it from accidental or unlawful destruction, misuse, loss, alteration, or unauthorised access or disclosure.

Your academic record is retained indefinitely so that the details of your academic achievements can be confirmed and for statistical or historical research purposes.

What will your personal information be used for?

Generally, Chisholm processes personal information collected from you to establish and maintain your student entitlements and obligations as part of your study with Chisholm and to help us engage with you and improve your experience at Chisholm. The personal information collected from you is necessary to properly administer your course, provide and administer relevant student services, to facilitate internal and strategic planning requirements and for government reporting purposes related to the provision of education.

The personal information that you provide will be collected by or on behalf of us and may be disclosed to third parties that help us deliver our educational and training services (including our business partners, information technology and communications service providers, payment system operators and relevant government departments and education regulators) or as required by law.

We also process personal information for the following purposes:

  • individual teaching areas collect and process personal information to administer courses and programs;
  • the personal information of graduates is provided to Chisholm’s alumni team for the purpose of fostering alumni relationships, maintaining and facilitating alumni networks, and promoting Chisholm activities; and
  • the collection of students' personal information is required under Commonwealth and State Government legislation for the purposes of government reporting.

If you choose not to provide your personal information, Chisholm may not be able to enrol you, provide you with your course of study, or provide you with the specific information, assistance, facilities or services that you have requested, and it may limit opportunities available to you.

If Chisholm holds personal information about you that was collected for a particular purpose (the primary purpose), Chisholm will not use or disclose this information for any other purpose unless you consented to the use or disclosure or you would reasonably expect Chisholm to use or disclose this information for secondary purpose (but this does not apply to sensitive or health information).

Sharing information with external organisations

We may disclose your personal information to third party organisations including organisations located outside of Victoria. The below paragraphs describe instances where this may occur:

Sharing with Victorian Government

The Victorian Government, through the Department of Education and Training (the Department), develops, monitors and funds vocational education and training (VET) in Victoria. Chisholm is required to provide the Department with student and training activity data. This includes personal information collected by Chisholm through enrolment and unique identifiers such as the Victorian Student Number (VSN) and the Commonwealth’s Unique Student Identifier (USI). Chisholm provides data to the Department in accordance with the Victorian VET Student Statistical Collection Guidelines, available at https://www.education.vic.gov.au/training/providers/rto/Pages/datacollection.aspx.

For further information about the way the Department collects and handles personal information, including access, correction and complaints, go to: https://www.education.vic.gov.au/Pages/privacypolicy.aspx.

For further information about Unique Student Identifiers, including access, correction and complaints, go to: https://www.usi.gov.au/documents/privacy-policy.

Sharing with National Vocational Education and Training Regulator

We are required by law (under the National Vocational Education and Training Regulator Act 2011 (Cth) (NVETR Act)) to provide data about our vocational education and training activities including personal information we collect about you to the Australian Government Department of Education, Skills and Employment (DESE) and the National VET Data Collection kept by the National Centre for Vocational Education Research Ltd (NCVER).

The NCVER is responsible for collecting, managing, analysing and communicating research and statistics about the Australian VET sector. The NCVER will collect, hold, use and disclose your personal information in accordance with the law, including the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) (Privacy Act), the NVETR Act and the DESE National VET Data Policy. DESE is authorised by law, including the Privacy Act and the NVETR Act, to collect, use and disclose your personal information to fulfil specified functions and activities. For more information please refer to National VET Data Policy.

For more information about how the NCVER will handle your personal information please refer to the NCVER’s Privacy Policy at https://ncver.edu.au/privacy. For more information about how the DESE will handle your personal information, please refer to VET Privacy Notice.

Sharing with other regulators

Chisholm may be required by law to disclose personal information with other regulators including:

  • Commonwealth Government agencies and regulators located outside of Victoria pursuant to Funding Agreements in place between Chisholm and these agencies and regulators or specific legislation requiring Chisholm to disclose personal information with these agencies and regulators
  • Agencies and organisation involved in quality assurance and planning for education such as the Australian Skills Quality Authority (ASQA); the Victorian Registration and Qualifications Authority (VRQA); the Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency (TEQSA); and the National Centre for Vocational Education Research (NCVER).

Sharing with other third parties

Some Chisholm IT systems use cloud computing services and are hosted in countries other than Australia. Depending on the service accessed this could include selected countries in the Americas, Europe or Asia-Pacific region. Similarly, contracted service providers including third party software and technology platform providers which Chisholm uses to perform services on its behalf (such as course administration, identification verification services, credential verification services) or enables a student to access or use as part of their study may be based outside of Victoria or outside of Australia. To enable students to access these services Chisholm may be required to share student personal information to set up user accounts in accordance with the third party provider’s end-user access requirements.

As part of your course you may be required to undertake work integrated learning such as practical placements or voluntary workplace activities. In those instances we may be required to share your personal information with host organisations and/or their agents or representatives to enable you to participate in the placement program.

To facilitate and enable programs relevant to your course we may be required to share your personal information with external organisations such as professional bodies, industry associations or government agencies.

If you participate in an exchange program, dual enrolment or similar arrangement with one of our international partners we may be required to share your personal information to the relevant partnering educational institution.

If you are an international student, we may disclose personal information about you to third parties located outside of Victoria in some circumstances. This may include: 

  • where we are required to disclose certain information about international students to the Commonwealth Government's Department of Home Affairs via Provider Registration and International Students Management System (PRISMS)
  • if applicable, disclosing information about you to the recruitment agent in your home country (unless you request that we do not disclose such information)
  • disclosing information about you to other third parties in your home country for marketing purposes, such as for promoting our educational services in your home country
  • with your consent, disclosing information about you to AusTrade in relation to any scholarships you may be receiving or
  • where we have a partnership with an educational institute in another country that delivers our qualifications at which you have a dual enrolment or at which you are participating in an exchange program, we may disclose information to that overseas educational institution (including your results).

Before Chisholm discloses personal information about you to a third party including a third party who is outside of Australia Chisholm will take steps that are reasonable in the circumstances to ensure that the recipient:

  • complies with its obligations under relevant privacy laws and only uses and processes the personal information for permitted purposes; and
  • does not transfer personal information outside of Australia without Chisholm’s consent and unless the overseas recipient provide an undertaking that the personal information will be protected at a standard comparable to Australian privacy laws
  • has in place appropriate security arrangement to prevent unauthorised access.

What rights of access and correction do you have?

You have the right to access and correct personal information about yourself under Victorian laws. In many instances current students will be able to access and correct your personal information by contacting Student Enquiry and Enrolment Services Contact Centre on 1300 244 746. If you are a past student please also refer to our Information Access page.

There may be circumstances where access to information cannot be granted as it may compromise the privacy of another individual. In those instances, Chisholm may require requests for access to be sought through the Freedom of Information Act 1982. Further information about this process is available on our Freedom of Information page.

Our student counselling service or other support services

We make a counselling service available to our students. If you receive counselling services from us, we may collect additional personal information about you, including health information about you, as part of providing this service. Health information includes any information or an opinion about an individual's physical, mental or psychological health, any disability that an individual has and any details of any health or medical services provided to an individual. 

We will only collect health information about you with your consent.

When you access any of our special category student support services further information on the types of information we may collect, our use and management of that information will be explained in the relevant privacy collection notices specific to those services.

Health and personal information about you collected for these services will only be used for the purpose of providing the services to you. Any counselling service that we provide is confidential and any information that you provide to us will be held in the strictest confidence. Any health information that we collect about you will be separately stored by our counsellors and will not form part of your student records.  

Surveys

You may receive a student survey which may be run by a government department or an NCVER employee, agent, third-party contractor or another authorised agency. Please note you may opt out of the survey at the time of being contacted.

How to make a complaint

If you think that we have breached your privacy, or if you wish to make a complaint about the way we have handled your personal information, you can contact us using any of the details on set out below under the 'Contact us' heading. Please include your name, email address and/or telephone number and clearly describe your complaint. We will acknowledge your complaint and respond to you regarding your complaint within a reasonable period of time. If you think that we have failed to resolve the complaint satisfactorily, we will provide you with information about the further steps that you can take. 

How to contact us

For further information about our Privacy Policy or our privacy practices, or to access or correct your personal information, or make a complaint, please contact us using the details set out below:

The Privacy Officer
121 Stud Road, Dandenong, Victoria, 3175
Email: privacy@chisholm.edu.au.