Privacy Policy

Updated July 2019

SMLS Privacy Policy A Commitment to Our Community

St. Mildred’s-Lightbourn School (the “School”) is committed to maintaining the confidentiality, accuracy and security of personal information provided to it in line with principles established in the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA). This Privacy Policy (“Policy”) describes the School’s personal information management practices. This Policy is subject to change, for example in response to changes in our practices. The date of the most recent revisions is posted above and we ask that you check it and review this Policy periodically.

Collection and Use of Personal Information

When you, as a parent, student, alumna or other individual, provide your personal information to the School, such as your name, address, email address and telephone number, it will be available to our staff, teachers and volunteers, including the Advancement Office and the SMLS Parent Association (PA), for the purposes described in this Privacy Policy. When you provide us with personal information about someone other than yourself, you are representing to the School that you have consent or are otherwise authorized to do so. We ask that you update personal information that you have provided to the School as it changes. The School collects and uses personal information of students for all matters related to their academic, educational and co-curricular program and activities, including without limitation, application, registration, participation, attendance, course of study, communications, administration, evaluation, grading and report cards, transcripts, references, scholarships and grants, awards, discipline, and health and related services. We use personal information of parents and guardians, including their contact and financial information, to communicate with them about matters relating to their child or ward and for administrative activities including registration and billing. We also collect aggregate information from our website visitors to enhance the visitor experience and assist in creating new services and functionality. The School also collects and uses student’s personal health information for purposes that include administering and providing or obtaining consent to treatment, participation in field trips, management of allergies and like conditions, and communicating about and managing emergencies. Personal information of our constituents, including students, parents and guardians, alumnae and staff, is used by the School to communicate announcements and urgent notices (for example, school closures due to inclement weather, as well as School news, information about School events, issues and opportunities for involvement so as to keep connected and strengthen our community.) We may collect personal information where we provide for newsletters and other communications, and on-line registration for School events. We also use personal information to communicate with our constituents about supporting the School. The School solicits the financial and volunteer support of its many constituents through the Advancement Office. While the School aims to celebrate the many donations and gifts to the School by publishing donor names in our Annual Report, on our Donor Wall or recognition plaques, we will refrain from publishing the name of any donor or volunteer who notifies our Privacy Compliance Officer or Head of School in writing of their wish to remain anonymous.

Protection of Personal Information, Service Providers

Personal information stored on School premises is stored in password-protected databases or files which we have secured. Access to personal information is restricted to staff, teachers and volunteers, who are authorized to use the information for the purposes described in this Policy, have received training in maintaining our privacy standards and applying our privacy policy and practices, and have signed a confidentiality agreement. We retain third parties to provide us with a variety of services, including mailing houses and information technology service providers. We choose our service providers carefully and impose obligations on them to protect any personal information that they use in the course of providing their services to the School. The security measures required of our service providers may include encryption and maintenance of personal information in secure facilities meeting generally accepted specifications and standards. We require our service providers to adhere to our privacy standards. Some of our service providers, including those supporting and maintaining our electronic information systems and maintaining data including personal information our behalf, operate in the United States. For this reason, personal information provided to us will be transferred to, used and stored in the United States. This information will be subject to the laws of both Canada and the United States and may be subject to disclosure under those laws, including to the Governments and Government agencies in both countries.

Disclosure of Personal Information

Under no circumstances does the School rent, sell or give personal information to any organization outside of the School, unless we are required to do so by law, the disclosure is necessary for the protection, rights, property, safety or administration of the School, for example for insurance purposes, or the information is required in connection with a reorganization of the School or a transaction, for example for the sale of School assets. The School endeavours to respect its constituents’ wishes in regard to the use and disclosure of their personal information, while acknowledging that it requires personal information for its operations and compliance with the law. Circumstances of which the School is unaware may have an impact on privacy. Parents and guardians are asked to ensure that the School has clear instructions as to who it is to contact and with whom it may share information about a student. The School cannot be held responsible for disclosing personal information of a student to a parent or guardian listed as such in the School’s records.

Cookies

To enhance your experience on our website, many of our web pages use cookies. Cookies are small text files that we place in your computer’s browser to store your preferences. Cookies, by themselves, do not tell us your email address or other personal information unless you choose to provide this information to us by, for example, registering at our website. Once you choose to provide a web page with personal information, this information may be linked to the data stored in the cookie. A cookie is like an identification card. It is unique to your computer and can only be read by the server that gave it to you. We use cookies to understand website usage and to improve the content and offerings on our website. For example, we may use cookies to personalize your experience on our web pages (e.g., to recognize you by name when you return to our website). We also may use cookies to provide you tailored offers of products and services. Cookies are essential to the proper functioning of the SMLS website. If you want to control which cookies you accept, you can configure your browser to accept all cookies or to alert you every time a website’s server offers a cookie. Most browsers automatically accept cookies. You can set your browser option so that you will not receive cookies and you can also delete existing cookies from your browser. However, we recommend you have cookies enabled to help us personalise your experience of our website. Some sections of our website use Google Analytics, a web analytics service provided by Google, Inc. Google Analytics uses cookies to help us analyze how people use our website. The information generated by the cookie about your use of the website includes your Internet network address. This information will be transmitted to and stored by Google on its servers. Google will use this information for the purpose of evaluating your use of the website, compiling reports on website activity for our website administrators, and providing other services relating to website activity and Internet usage. Google may also transfer this information to third parties where required to do so by law, or where such third parties process the information on Google’s behalf. Google will not associate your network address with any other data held by Google. To disable Google Analytics’ tracking of your usage of our website, you may disable cookies in your browser; however please note that by doing so you may not be able to use the full functionality of this website. By using this website, you consent to the processing of data about you by Google in the manner and for the purposes set out above. To learn more, visit the Google Analytics Privacy Overview and Google’s privacy policy. In addition, please see Google Analytics’ currently available opt-outs for the web.

Links from Third Party Portals and Sites

In order to receive some services from the School, you may need to go through third party portals or use third party services. In those instances, the collection, use and disclosure of your information will also be subject to the terms of such third party’s privacy policy. We ask that you review those and confirm you accept those terms prior to proceeding. In some instances, the third party whose portal is used to access certain of our services may share certain personal information with the School. In such instances, the personal information provided to the School will be subject to the terms of this Privacy Policy. Access, Correction, Inquiries You have the right to access and request the correction of your personal information held by the School. We will endeavour to process your request within approximately 30 days. The School may ask for additional information it needs to process a request or to verify identity and ensure that it does not disclose personal information to someone who is not authorized to receive it or otherwise in violation of this Policy. To request access or the correction of your personal information, or for additional information about this Policy, the School’s privacy practices or our management of your personal information, please contact privacy@smls.on.ca.