The explanation may lie in the Race Relations
(Amendment) Act 2000 and the statutory duty to promote
race equality. This cannot be done without monitoring
the ethnicity of pupils and, ideally, checking the
correspondence between the school's intake and the
local Census population. Educational achievement also
need to be monitored by ethnic group to ensure
particular groups are not being discriminated against:
cultural barriers can be very insidiuos.
See:
http://www.cre.gov.uk/duty/index.html
http://www.legislation.hmso.gov.uk/acts/acts2000/00034--c.htm#sch1
"Specific duties for schools and FE and HE
institutions
Schools must:
prepare and publish a race equality policy
monitor and assess how their policies affect ethnic
minority pupils, staff and parents; the emphasis here
is on pupils' achievements
Higher and further education institutions must:
prepare a race equality policy
assess how their policies affect ethnic minority
students and staff
arrange to publish their policy, and the results of
assessments and monitoring"
That said, the school may need to redraw its forms to
furnish some explanation. And studies have found an
association between free school meals as a proxy for
deprivation, and other events, including incidence of
domestic violence - a useful data item.
Incidentally, the school does not appear to be asking
about language. I find that fascinatingly intriguing.
There's more to law than data protection :-)
Giovanna Maria --- Roland Perry
<[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> My son is going to a new school in September, and
> they have asked for
> various personal data. Including Ethnic Origin. Does
> anyone have any
> idea why this is required (particularly in the light
> of principles 2&3)?
>
> Intake to the school appears to be entirely on the
> basis of catchment
> area (so no quotas on specific religions or ethnic
> origin), and we
> indisputably live within that catchment area.
>
> --
> Roland Perry
>
>
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