Privacy Policy

Your Privacy Matters: Our Commitment to Data Protection

A. Preamble

In this Privacy Policy ("Policy"), "we", "our" and "us" refer to Sunbeam World School, the brand name of Sunbeam World School Society, an online school offering education to students in India and internationally.

"You" and "user" include the student registered with Sunbeam World School and the student's parent or legal guardian. Where a student is under 18, we treat the parent or legal guardian as the person who gives permissions and makes choices on the student's behalf.

This Policy explains what personal information we collect, why we collect it, how we use, share, store and protect it, and the choices and rights you have. We handle personal information in line with applicable data protection laws, including India's Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023, and the laws of other countries where they apply to our students.

B. Scope

This Policy applies to:

• Visitors to our public website (www.sunbeamworldschool.com), including people who fill in enquiry, demo or brochure forms;
• Applicants and enrolled students and their families, from admission onwards;
• School-managed learning platforms, including our LMS, mobile application, live-class tools and official communication channels.

Where a section applies only to one of these groups, it says so.

Our website may link to third-party websites. Those websites have their own privacy practices, which we do not control, so please read their policies before sharing information with them.

We take reasonable technical and organisational steps to protect personal information, including access controls, secure systems and staff training, in line with applicable law and industry practice.

C. Personal Information We Collect

"Personal information" means information that identifies a student, parent or guardian. Depending on how you interact with us, this may include:

• Contact and enquiry details: name, phone number, email address and country, when you submit a form or contact us;
• Admission details: the student's name, date of birth, gender, previous academic records and identity documents requested for admission;
• Learning information: attendance, assignments, assessment results, progress reports and activity on our learning platforms;
• Class recordings: recordings of live online classes, as explained in Section H;
• Payment information: fee and payment details, collected only when needed and processed through secure payment providers;
• Support and needs information: information about health, learning or accessibility needs that a family chooses to share so we can support the student. This is shared only with staff who need it.

You can browse our public website without giving us your personal information.

D. Communications We Send You

We send two kinds of communication, and treat them differently:

• Essential school communications (enrolled families): timetables, class updates, assessment results, fee notices, safety information and policy changes. These are part of providing our education service, so you cannot opt out of them while enrolled.
• Optional promotional communications: information about new courses, offers, events and admissions campaigns. We send these by call, SMS, email or WhatsApp only where you have agreed to receive them or where the law otherwise allows it, and we respect Do Not Disturb (DND) registrations and the communication preferences you set.

You can stop promotional messages at any time by replying "STOP", using the unsubscribe link, or contacting us using the details in Section K. Stopping promotional messages does not affect your child's admission, teaching or school services.

E. Correcting Your Personal Information

If any personal information we hold is incorrect or out of date, you can ask us to correct or update it. We may ask you to verify your identity before making changes, to protect your account. If we have genuine reason to believe a request is not coming from the account holder, or that making the change would put someone's information at risk, we may delay the change while we verify it, and we will tell you why.

F. How We Use and Share Personal Information

We use personal information for the following purposes:

• Responding to enquiries and processing admissions;
• Delivering classes, assessments, reports and student support;
• Managing fees, accounts and school administration;
• Sending essential school communications, and optional promotions where you have agreed (Section D);
• Keeping students and our platforms safe and secure;
• Improving our teaching and services. Where we study learning patterns for this purpose, we use aggregated or de-identified information wherever possible;
• Meeting our legal and regulatory obligations, including those of examination and awarding bodies.

Where the law requires separate consent for a particular use, we will ask for it separately and explain what it is for. You can withdraw that consent later, as described in Section K.

Sharing: we do not sell personal information. We share it only where needed for the purposes above, with:

• Service providers who help us run the school, such as learning-platform, video-class, payment, hosting and communication providers. They may use the information only to provide their service to us, under contracts that require them to protect it;
• Examination boards and awarding bodies, for registration, assessment and certification;
• Others where the law requires or permits it, as described in Section I.

Some of these providers may store information outside India. Where that happens, we take steps to make sure it is protected as required by applicable law.

Login credentials are for the registered student and family only. Please do not share them with anyone else.

G. Photographs, Videos and Publicity

We will not use a student's photograph, video, voice, name, schoolwork or testimonial in any publicity unless a parent or guardian (or the student, if 18 or over) has given specific permission.

• Separate choices: we ask for publicity permission on a separate form, not as part of admission or general school terms. You can choose separately for each type of content (photographs, videos, voice recordings, schoolwork and testimonials) and for each channel: our website, social media, printed materials and advertising, and press or media.
• Saying no is fine: declining publicity permission, or giving it for some things and not others, will never affect your child's admission, teaching, assessment, support, participation in activities, or recognition and awards.
• Permission register: we keep a record of every family's publicity choices. Staff must check this record before publishing any identifiable image, recording, work or testimonial of a student.

Withdrawing publicity permission

You can withdraw or change your permission at any time by contacting us using the details in Section K. Once we receive your request, we will:

• Stop any new use of your child's content;
• Remove it from channels we control, such as our website and social media accounts, within 10 working days.

We cannot recall printed materials that have already been distributed, and we cannot remove copies that third parties (for example, news websites or people who shared a post) have made. Where possible, we will ask third parties we worked with to remove the content.

H. Class Recordings for Learning

Class recordings are separate from publicity. Live online classes may be recorded so that students can revisit lessons, catch up on missed classes, and so that we can maintain teaching quality and student safety.

• Who can access them: students and families of that class, the class teacher and authorised academic and safeguarding staff.
• How long we keep them: [retention period, until the end of the academic year], after which they are deleted, unless they are needed to investigate a safety concern or complaint.
• Not used for publicity: class recordings are never used for promotion unless publicity permission has been given under Section G.

I. When We May Disclose Information Without Your Consent

We may share personal information without your consent only where it is necessary:

• To comply with a law, regulation or request from a lawfully authorised government authority;
• To comply with an order of a court or tribunal;
• To detect, prevent or address fraud, security or technical issues;
• To protect a student or any other person from harm, or to protect the rights and safety of the school.

We share only the information needed for that purpose.

J. Protecting Accounts and Platforms

If information uploaded to our platforms breaks this Policy or our school rules, or if an account appears to be misused or at risk, we may take proportionate steps to protect students and our platforms. These may include removing specific content, or temporarily restricting part or all of an account.

• We will tell you the reason, unless doing so would put someone at risk or interfere with an investigation;
• Any restriction will be reviewed promptly, and you can ask for a review using the route in Section K;
• Where a student's account is affected, we will make arrangements so that their learning can continue wherever it is safe to do so.

K. Your Choices, Privacy Concerns and Reviews

You can ask us to access, correct or update your personal information, withdraw a consent you have given, change your publicity choices, stop promotional messages, or raise any privacy concern.