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Primary education

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Original poster

Safeguarding at nursery!

33 replies

Katiexk · 13/04/2022 20:51

I’ve recently started working at a nursery, it’s only been a month and I don’t have much experience. However I have just learnt that a staff member uses the online journal at home outside of work hours. By logging in at home she has access to all their information, pictures, videos and parents information on her personal phone.
Is this illegal? Is she breaking any rules.
It doesn’t sit right with me, but I want to know if it is worth reporting?
She also said the managers do not know.

OP posts:

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LIZS · 13/04/2022 20:57

Definitely a gdpr and potential safeguarding risk. However if she keeps her phone otherwise logged out it is probably ok. Are there any rules about access to and using the journal?

PathOfLeastResitance · 14/04/2022 07:54

I’m a teacher and I access everything about the children I work with from home. Photos, videos, work examples. I’m trusted at work and that extends to home. No other way that it would all get done.

TulipsGarden · 14/04/2022 07:56

This wouldn't concern me particularly, although obviously it's not GDPR-compliant. But it likely means she doesn't have time to get it done during her writing hours, which is not fair.

Lily7050 · 14/04/2022 15:38

Does she need to post any updates on children's journals?
Over the past two year people were forced to do payroll, HR work etc. from home accessing employees personal information including bank accounts.

Persephonegoddess · 14/04/2022 16:10

If her managers did not know and she has told you that, massive red flag report to managers. Simple

nutellingyou · 14/04/2022 16:21

She shouldn't be accessing it on her phone but it's ok to access their files online on a work computer or tablet. Honestly, otherwise she'd end up spending time on them at work rather than working with/supervising the children which would actually be a potential safeguarding situation.

OnceuponaRainbow18 · 14/04/2022 16:39

I’m a secondary teacher and access info about all kids from my mobile and at home. Don’t see the difference to being at school. What are you worried about?

Littlescottiedog · 14/04/2022 16:51

What does the nursery's IT policy say? Some schools say that only school equipment should be used to access pupil data, some are fine with it being accessed on other devices as long as data isn't being stored on those devices (so can't download photos to your phone for example). Different places have different policies.

WalkerWalking · 14/04/2022 16:58

At the school I teach in, staff are expected to log into school apps from home. We're not provided with school laptops, so we have to use personal laptops/ipads/phones. In fact, it's very common to see teachers filling in morning registers on their phones during assembly. On school trips and sports fixtures, I've had to look up parents' phone numbers using my personal phone.

This did make me uncomfortable at first, but no one in SLT sees it as a problem. I guess if you're trusted at school then you're also trusted at home 🤷‍♀️

WalkerWalking · 14/04/2022 16:59

But yes, as above- we are absolutely not allowed to store (take or download) images of children on our personal devices.

Aimee1987 · 14/04/2022 17:02

I'm a lecturer and work from home I can log in and access students records, students addresses ( home and on campus), grades, photos, assignments ect for the several thousand students at my uni.

My work computer needs a pin and password to login and is not used for anything other then my work.
With the increase in wfh there are alot of professions that allow the admin side of the job to be done at home and requires staff to login to complete it.

grafittiartist · 14/04/2022 17:07

Doing it on a personal device makes me nervous- but I have a school chrome book on which I regularly access and use data on.

GeorgieTheGorgeousGoat · 14/04/2022 17:09

I'm a childminder and obviously do all this, what's the difference?

ldontWanna · 14/04/2022 17:12

Have you asked her why?

Soontobe60 · 14/04/2022 17:15

I couldn’t do my job as a teacher if I couldn’t access the school server from home. I have to use an authentication app to do so.
If the Nursery don’t want staff to access the info at home, they should give the staff enough time to complete the tasks within the working day.

Foolsrule · 15/04/2022 14:22

This makes me very uncomfortable. There should be an IT policy in place and it should stipulate exactly what happens/when. Ideally, staff would use devices in the workplace and not need to log in at home, and certainly not from their own personal phones/tablets. Is this a big chain?

tiredanddangerous · 15/04/2022 14:27

I think this is pretty normal. I work in a school and have had to access everything from home on my personal laptop when at home with covid etc. All of the staff do.

FTEngineerM · 15/04/2022 14:27

Isn’t that the same as me having access to the famly app and everyone’s kids ?

OnceuponaRainbow18 · 15/04/2022 16:52

@Foolsrule

Why does it make you uncomfortable? Surely thou trust the people who care for your children, if not why would you leave them in their care?

If I wanted to at this mo I could use my mobile and log into my work network and see any data or info about 2000 kids, including any safeguarding concerns, we are professionals and are trusted

Foolsrule · 15/04/2022 17:21

@OnceuponaRainbow18 - because it goes against so much of what we’re taught about safeguarding and data security.

Magnoliayellowbird · 15/04/2022 17:25

[quote Foolsrule]@OnceuponaRainbow18 - because it goes against so much of what we’re taught about safeguarding and data security.[/quote]
Safeguarding, security? What do you think a nursery worker is going to do with the information? Surely she needs access to the files so I don't see that it matters which computer or phone she uses.

OnceuponaRainbow18 · 15/04/2022 17:58

@Foolsrule

I can’t speak for nurseries but in every school I’ve worked in it’s not been a problem, and I’m in a safeguarding role

girlmom21 · 15/04/2022 18:05

What's the nursery policy? Why does she need to access it from home?

mrziggycoco · 15/04/2022 18:28

[quote OnceuponaRainbow18]@Foolsrule

Why does it make you uncomfortable? Surely thou trust the people who care for your children, if not why would you leave them in their care?

If I wanted to at this mo I could use my mobile and log into my work network and see any data or info about 2000 kids, including any safeguarding concerns, we are professionals and are trusted[/quote]
There is literally no way to know that people who work with children are trustworthy, in fact anyone wanting to harm children purposefully goes to work with children and are only banned if they are caught. There's loads of examples of people employed to care for children hurting children.

RachelSq · 15/04/2022 18:46

The only part of this that concerns me is that her manager doesn’t know it’s happening. Did she mention for what reason she was accessing it?

In a practical sense, this type of data is accessed at home by so many people WFH so the fact it’s accessible isn’t an issue as such but as others have said there does need to be some controls and policies in place.

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