Access to students’ personal data will be limited to professional employees covered by the Professional Secrecy Act or to those who have sworn an oath of confidentiality, Education Minister Evarist Bartolo said yesterday.

He was addressing a press conference on the contentious reform of the Employment and Training Services Act that will amend laws on access to student data.

Mr Bartolo said criteria had been set to ensure student safety, as respecting data protection was a top priority for the government.

The legal reform, proposed last year, had sparked outrage among teachers, students and other stakeholders, with the Opposition claiming it allowed the government to have open access to sensitive data, putting students at risk.

Criteria had been set to ensure student safety

The government subsequently repealed the controversial legal notice allowing the education department to collect personal data pertaining to students and their parents, and replaced it with new rules that introduce data protection safeguards.

Mr Bartolo said that a working group, chaired by Data Protection Commissioner Saviour Cachia, had drafted a report on the way information should be accessed.

Educational institutions and examination bodies are to use pseudonymous data rather than identifiable information when processing student documents and examination papers.

Any follow-ups deemed necessary will be directed by the competent authorities rather than the schools themselves.

Data used for research or statistical purposes, meanwhile, will have to be rendered completely anonymous. If research may require any follow-up contact with certain students, this again will be done through pseudonyms to protect the students concerned.

This, the report said, is based on practices already employed across the EU. More sensitive research on the other hand will have to be given the go-ahead by the Education Ministry directly.

Civil Liberties Minister Helena Dalli also attended the press conference. She insisted the previous legal notice had been issued following approval by the former Data Protection Commissioner and that the government had not tried to impose a law that would breach citizen’s rights.