Educational Records

If you are a parent of a child who is, or was a pupil at a school, you can get access to their educational records. Parent has a wider definition than just Parental Responsibility and includes natural parents.

Educational records are defined in the Data Protection Act 1998 Schedule 11.

1 For the purposes of section 68 “educational record” means any record to which paragraph 2, 5 or 7 applies.

England and Wales

2 This paragraph applies to any record of information which—E+W+S+N.I.

(a)is processed by or on behalf of the governing body of, or a teacher at, any school in England and Wales specified in paragraph 3,

(b)relates to any person who is or has been a pupil at the school, and

(c)originated from or was supplied by or on behalf of any of the persons specified in paragraph 4,

other than information which is processed by a teacher solely for the teacher’s own use.

The Education (Pupil Information) (England) Regulations 2005 paragraph 5 states the school shall make a pupil's educational records available for inspection by a parent within 15 school days of receipt of a written request for access. They are also required to provide a copy of this record, but can charge a fee for this.

The NAHT (National Association for All School Leaders or Head Teachers as they used to be knows) publishes a booklet on dealing with family conflict called Pupil and Parent Matters. Page 3 defines access to Educational Records and says the school does not have the power to act on the request of one parent to restrict the access of another.