CM Club: Photograph dispersal & confidentiality for parents

[KatyMac]

OK this is complicated

Because I have a few chidren I have a photo policy which says you might get photos of other children & they might get photos of your child

"Photographs - Photographs will be taken for craft projects, scrapbooks, for displays at WC and for the children to take home. They will not be reproduced or passed to anyone else, however will be stored digitally. It should be noted that some photos you will get will show another child and it must be understood that other parents may get a picture of your child as part of a group photo."

But once the photo is in a child's diary or folder what can the parents do with it then?? Put it on Facebook??

Also if 2 (or 3) parents are here together and chatting confidential stuff might be discussed so I need another statement about that

So any ideas about wording?

You could say that once the photo is in the possession of another parent you can not be held responsible for it - or something along those lines..... and if a parent has a problem with this then please let you know

You can say in your confidentiality policy that YOU maintain confidentiality and as such would appreciate it if parents could bear this in mind when within your setting - or something like this

Tricky isn't it?

I came up with
"Confidentiality ? Although our staff are careful about each child and families confidentiality; it is in the nature of a small setting that you may learn private information about another child/family. I would prefer that any information gained through connection with WC be retained as confidential, as I am sure you would prefer information learnt about you to be kept private.

Photographs - Photographs will be taken for craft projects, scrapbooks, for displays at WC and for the children to take home. They will not be reproduced or passed to anyone else, however will be stored digitally. It should be noted that some photos you will get will show another child and it must be understood that other parents may get a picture of your child as part of a group photo. As you may have a copy of a photo depicting another child (apart from your own) I expect you to give that child the privacy you would expect yourself. Therefore photograph depicting children other than your own should not be ?put into the public domain? this would mean they cannot be posted on any social networking sites (eg Facebook) or made public in any way."

I think that should cover it, it does get very difficult.

Another option would be to play with the photos before you print them, so that another childs face can not be identified...... gets really complicated doesn't it???

Mum, that's what my ds nursery did with photos from last years nativity as some parents objected to their child's photo being taken.

I am lucky that all of my parents are very good about this - I actually got told of for not putting a mindees photo on facebook!! but I have heard of the photo editor thing before

It isn't an issue it's a bureaucracy

But can I add anything else?

I hate having to put everything in writing

Thanks for posting Katy, this occurred to me a while back but I forgot to put anything in my handbook. (my to-do list is already 10 sub-pages in One-Note )

I used to have a family that didnt give permission for any photos to be taken. Which meant I couldn't take photos of anyone else when they were there as they all wanted to be in them. I also had to take mobiles off the mindees as they kept taking photos of the babies.

so mindee's mobiles go in the home box except when we're on outings.

Bump for other ideas

Problem is once you've given the photograph to the parents there's nothing you can actually do to stop them putting it in the public domain. You could subsequently give notice to them them if you see a photo on a site, for example, but once it's out there, it's out there.

Also, in saying that you expect parents to give others' children the privacy they expect for their own, you are not covering those who have no problem in posting their own children's photos online.

The only reasonable stance you can take is that you maintain privacy (no online publication etc) but that you simply cannot be held responsible for what parents do with photos in their possession. And if parents are unhappy with that then you're unfortunately in a situation where you can take group photos for your own use but can't give them to any parents. I don't see anyway around that?

Tricky isn't it

The parents love the group photos