TASO: Summer School Information Sheet
Summer School Evaluation
Participant Information Sheet
Ethical approval reference: 2021/378
Dear student,
We are running a research project to test whether participation in a university summer school will help students to aspire and progress to university. The summer school you have applied to is part of this project.
What is the purpose of the research project?
● Many universities run summer schools as a way of encouraging students to consider attending university in future, and to give them the skills to apply.
● The aim of the project is to understand whether these summer schools are effective at helping a greater number of students aspire to attend university and to attend in future.
● This project is funded and run by the Centre for Transforming Access and Student Outcomes in Higher Education (TASO). TASO is funded by the Office for Students, the independent regulator of higher education in England.
What does this project mean for students?
● You have applied to attend a summer school involved in this project.
● Because there are a limited number of places on the summer schools, not everyone who wants to attend will be able to.
● Applicants who meet the university criteria will be randomly split into two groups. To do this we will use the information from your application to the summer school. Students in one group will be offered a place on the summer school, and those in the other group will not be offered a place.
● To make sure these two groups are matched in terms of characteristics (such as gender) we will look at your applicant information to carry out the randomisation process.
● By comparing how many students from each of the two groups apply for university in the future we will seek to understand whether the summer school has a positive impact on participants.
● Even if you don’t get a spot, we will invite you to be part of our research project.
● You will be asked to complete three questionnaires about your hopes for and feelings about university – first when you apply for the summer school and two after the summer school.
● You might be invited to complete the questionnaires on paper or online while at the summer school and/or might receive an email from the university asking you to complete it online.
● The questionnaires should take no longer than 10 minutes each to complete.
● Whether you attend the summer school or not, you’ll be asked to complete these questionnaires.
● The questionnaires will ask you about:
o Intention to apply to university
o Sense of belonging in university
o Knowledge of university
● To say thank you for completing the questionnaires, you will be asked whether you want to be entered into a prize draw. You’ll be eligible to be entered into the prize draw even if you choose to be removed from the research at a later stage.
● You may be asked to take part in a focus group/interview to find out in more detail how you feel about the summer school and university. You do not have to take part in these but if you do you will be offered a voucher to the value of £5 to compensate you for your time.
● If you choose not to take part in this research (see ‘Do I have to take part?’ section below), you will not be invited to complete the questionnaires or to take part in a focus group/interview.
What other data will be collected?
● We will match the questionnaire data with other student data collected as part of the summer school project. This data will include:
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- Your data will be linked to information stored by a tracking service the university is using.2 The tracking service will match your data with the information in the box below and share it back with us if they hold it.
If not already gathered:[3]
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Other data to be gathered:
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For longitudinal tracking purposes, the tracking service will match your details to government data held by the Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA), on the Individualised Learner Record (ILR) and on the National Pupil Database (NPD) to gather more complete data on your background and to see whether you progress to further and/or higher education in future, where you go and what you study.
● Your data will also be shared with our independent evaluator (the Behavioural Insights Team). TASO and the Behavioural Insights Team may also match this data with data on the Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA), on the Individualised Learner Record (ILR) and on the National Pupil Database (NPD) to gather more complete data on your background, your attainment and to see whether you progress to further and/or higher education in future, where you go, and what you study.
● Collecting and linking the data means we can work out if the summer school has been effective at helping students progress to university and we can measure differences between the different groups of participants (for example, by gender).
● Because it will be a year or two before you are old enough to apply to higher education, we will track your outcomes over the period until 2025 to understand the long-term impact of the summer school.
● For the purpose of data protection law, TASO’s lawful basis for processing the data is the ‘legitimate interests’ condition set out in the General Data Protection (GDPR). TASO’s legitimate interest is that the processing of data for this project is necessary to be able to meet its charitable objectives to improve equality in higher education as a benefit to society.
● In respect of ethnicity data, which is treated as ‘special category’ data for the purposes of data protection law, our lawful basis for processing the data is ‘research’ conditions set out in the GDPR and the UK Data Protection Act 2018. Please contact us with any questions.
How is the data protected?
● We have written a Data Privacy Notice alongside this Information Sheet so we can be transparent with you about how we will be using your personal data. You can access the Privacy Notice here.
● TASO and the university running the summer school which you have applied to will be joint controllers of the data collected for this research project.
● When data is shared by the university with TASO, the data collected will be stored on TASO’s password protected computer drives. Data will be encrypted and password protected.
● The data will not be transferred outside the United Kingdom or the European Economic Area.
● This project will end on 1 January 2025. All personal data will be kept for three years after the project ends and either destroyed or archived after 1 January 2028.
● Your data will be processed in accordance with the UK General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). This means that when we analyse the questionnaire responses or administrative data, that data will be kept safe on our computers, won’t be shared outside of our team (except where we’ve explained we will share data in this sheet), won’t be kept longer than needed and when we report the findings no one will be able to pick out who the respondent is (i.e. you can not be identified within the report). We won’t use names and we’ll assign completed questionnaires with a number, so that no one will know it is the analysis of any specific individual’s outcomes.
● You have the right to access information held about you. Your right of access can be exercised in accordance with the UK GDPR. You also have other rights including rights of correction, erasure and objection. Your personal data is not subject to any automated decision making.
Questions, comments and requests about your personal data can also be sent to the TASO’s Data Protection Officer Mr James Robson (dpo@theevidencequarter.com).
If you wish to lodge a complaint with the Information Commissioner’s Office, please visit www.ico.org.uk.
Do I have to take part?
You do not need to take part. To opt-out of your data being tracked for this research project, please email the university summer school contact at [insert email] within X weeks of receiving this information sheet. Deciding not to take part in this research project will not have any impact on the outcome of your application to a summer school and how likely you are to get a place.
What if I change my mind?
If you change your mind at a later date you can email the research team at the email address below to ask them to delete data and questionnaire responses from the study up until 1 January 2025. You do not need to provide a reason for this.
What will happen after the summer school?
Once we’ve collected all the data outlined in this sheet we will analyse it and write a report on whether summer schools seem to help students to attend university. All of the questionnaire answers and other data will be anonymous (i.e., it won’t be possible to know who took part). This means we won’t say who said what and we won’t include any personal information (like names or details individuals might be recognised by) in our report. We will publish this report and will provide all universities holding summer schools with a copy which they can share with your school. We’ll ask them to check that students won’t be recognisable in what we’ve written.
What if I have further questions, or if something goes wrong?
If this study has harmed you in any way or if you wish to make a complaint about the conduct of the study you can contact TASO using the details below for further advice and information.
Email: research@taso.org.uk
Address: TASO, Evidence Quarter, 4th Floor, Albany House, Petty France, London, SW1H 9EA