Privacy notice for Individual Staff Circumstances Disclosure Form

How we use your information

The personal data you provide will be used to fulfil the equality-related requirements of the Research Excellence Framework (REF) 2021 exercise. The purpose of collecting this information is:

1. To recognise the effect that circumstances can have on an individual’s ability to research productively, and to adjust expectations in terms of the expected production of research outputs
2. To establish whether there are any Units of Assessment where the proportion of declared circumstances is sufficiently high to warrant a request to the higher education funding bodies for a reduction to the total number of outputs to be submitted by that unit
3. To enable staff with applicable circumstances who have not been able to produce a research output during the assessment period to be submitted to REF without the minimum requirement of one output.

Retention of data

All individual Staff Circumstances Disclosure Forms and associated correspondence held by the University of Dundee for the purposes of REF will be destroyed within 6 weeks of publication of the REF results.

Personal data

The personal data processed for this purpose is your name, staff identification number, e-mail address (required) and telephone number (optional).

Special categories of personal data

The special category data you may choose to voluntarily disclose that will be processed by the University is:

• Information about protected characteristics including: age, disability, gender reassignment, marriage and civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief and sexual orientation
• Information about any maternity, paternity, adoption/surrogacy, shared parental leave and time off for dependants, or other caring responsibilities, including dates where the disclosure of this information reveals something concerning the special categories of personal data (e.g. healthcare information)
• Information about ill health, injury or mental health conditions

Data controller

The data controller for your personal information is the University of Dundee. Your data will be processed by the University’s nominated agents such as software or service providers. The University will use Microsoft Office 365 (our productivity software) and Box.com (our file sharing software) to process your information.

The University will also use the REF 2021 module of the University’s Current Research Information System, Discovery (also known as Pure), to process your information as part of the preparation for the University’s REF submission; please refer to the Privacy Notice for Discovery for more information.

Lawful processing

The University asserts that it is lawful for it to process your personal information to comply with a legal obligation to which it is subject, for the performance of a task in the public interest or in the exercise of the University’s official authority.

The University asserts that it is lawful for it to process special categories of your personal data for the purpose of carrying out obligations in the field of employment and social security and social protection law (Equality Act 2010).

Your rights

The University respects your rights and preferences in relation to your data. If you wish to make a request to update, access, erase, or limit the use of your information, please let us know by emailing refequality@dundee.ac.uk and the University will consider it appropriately. Please note that your rights are limited in certain circumstances and we will explain that to you if applicable. If you wish to complain about the use of your information please email dataprotection@dundee.ac.uk. You may also wish to contact the Information Commissioner’s Office.