SPR 147 – Springpod Work Experience Information

Springpod provides market-leading and innovative work experience services that are helping students take control of their future. We’re working with some of the most exciting brands to create and deliver compelling and engaging virtual work experiences, assisting students in learning critical skills and forming better ideas for their future.

It’s our privilege to be supporting hundreds of thousands of students by offering them access to these experiences, so we have prepared this generic information specifically to give education providers all the assurance and information they need to support their students from their side because we can’t respond to individual requests for information.

We hope you find this information useful and regret that we may not be able to respond to individual requests where the information has already been made available through this or any of our other notices.

Springpod’s innovative work experience programmes are delivered virtually using our online platform, so students can access the programmes from their own homes or other workplaces that work for them. There’s no need to spend any money or take any time to commute to a workplace.

When students register for Springpod’s virtual work experience programmes, they receive all the information they need to access the programmes online via their Springpod account.

Safeguarding is our top priority at Springpod. We have a safeguarding policy and processes in place; we don’t allow any contact with students unless the interaction is supervised by a DBS Cleared representative of Springpod. We have a Safeguarding Lead to deal with any issues arising.

Springpod has appropriate insurance in place. Here’s a summary of the applicable sections for information:

Springpod takes the protection of personal data seriously. All our data processing is carried out in line with regulations, and we take care to ensure that students are in complete control of their personal data.

For a student to have an account on springpod.com, they need to input the following pieces of information:

• Their name

• Their email address, which becomes their username (Validated by two step-verification).

• Their password, which is created by themselves, applying the standards required by ISO27001.

• Their age (In so much as they must agree that they are over 13 years old.

• Activity on the site

• Education and work activity

Students also need to agree to the Springpod.com terms and conditions.

This information is processed lawfully under the basis of necessity per GDPR Article 6, part 1(b). To help our employers ensure that opportunities are right and to help them comply with their obligations under the Equality Act 2010, we also give students the option to supply the following information:

• Their school

• Their year groups

• Their gender

• Their ethnicity

This information is processed lawfully under the basis of Legitimate Interest per GDPR Article 6, Part 1(f) and the prohibition in GDPR Article 9, given some of the information being classed as ‘Special Category Data’ is exempt under GDPR Article 9, Part 2 (b) because the information is used for the purpose of employment.

Students are also given the opportunity to allow Springpod permission to use the information they have provided for marketing purposes, including sharing the information with third parties for marketing.

Student Data may be shared with Parents, Employers, and Education providers under the lawful bases of necessity and/or legitimate interest where applicable, unless the Student has objected to that in the case of legitimate interest.

This Risk Assessment aims to ensure the safety of students attending Springpod's virtual work experience.

Springpod has no appetite for impact on our business resulting from poor risk management of work experiences.

Springpod also has no appetite for impact on users or third parties caused by poor risk management of work experiences.

Springpod operates a robust and thorough risk management programme, so all that anyone needs to do if something goes wrong is let someone from Springpod know. Care will be taken to ensure that any incidents are reported and managed appropriately, investigations will take place to understand root causes, and steps will be taken to prevent recurrences.

Springpod manages our business risk and compliance using a Risk Management Framework which is managed and overseen by the Risk & Compliance Officer.

The Risk Management Framework is backed up by a suite of policies and procedures that have been specifically designed to minimise risk and ensure regulatory compliance.

The Framework allows us to manage our business risk, regulatory compliance, incidents, and their parties centrally and take appropriate measures to ensure everyone’s safety and security.

Check out Springpod.com or our policies for more information.