Last updated: 23 February 2026.

1. Introduction

Creative Arts Circles (creativeartscircles.org) is committed to protecting the privacy of everyone who visits or interacts with this website. This Privacy Statement explains what personal information we collect, how we use it, and what rights you have in relation to it.

This website is operated by the Creative Arts Circles Team, currently based at the School of Education at the University of Southern Queensland (USQ). We handle all personal information in accordance with the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) and the Australian Privacy Principles (APPs).

2. Who This Statement Applies To

This statement applies to all visitors to this website, including educators who browse our Resource Library, participants in our research surveys (Teachers Survey and Writers Survey), contributors to our Writing Circles, registered users and authors, and anyone who contacts us through our Contact Us page.

3. What Information We Collect

Information you provide directly

When you interact with this website, we may collect personal information that you voluntarily provide, including your name and email address (if you submit a contact form, register an account, or participate in a survey), your professional role and school or organisation (for research participants), survey responses and feedback you choose to share, and comments or contributions you post on the site.

Information collected automatically

Like most websites, this site automatically collects certain technical information when you visit. This is done in part through Google Analytics, a web analytics service provided by Google LLC. Google Analytics collects information including your IP address (which is anonymised before storage), your browser type and version, the pages you visit and the time of your visit, the website that referred you to this site, and your approximate geographic location (at city or region level).

This information is transmitted to and stored on Google’s servers, which may be located outside Australia. Google LLC processes data in accordance with its own privacy policy, available at policies.google.com/privacy. We use Google Analytics solely to understand how visitors use this website and to improve its content and performance. We do not use Google Analytics data to identify individual users.

Cookies

This website uses cookies — small text files stored on your device — to support core website functions and analytics. These include analytics cookies set by Google Analytics to track page visits and user behaviour in aggregate, session cookies that keep you logged in during a visit, preference cookies that remember your display settings, and comment cookies that save your name and email if you opt in when leaving a comment.

You can control or disable cookies through your browser settings. You may also opt out of Google Analytics tracking across all websites by installing the Google Analytics Opt-out Browser Add-on. Please note that disabling some cookies may affect your experience of the site. We do not use cookies for advertising or to track you across unrelated websites.

4. How We Use Your Information

We use the information we collect to operate and improve this website and its resources, to analyse website usage through Google Analytics and improve the site’s content and navigation, to administer and analyse research surveys as part of the Creative Arts Circles Research Project, to communicate with you about the project and respond to enquiries, to acknowledge contributors to writing circles and resources where consent has been given, to produce academic publications and reports based on aggregated and de-identified research data, and to detect and prevent spam or misuse of the website.

We will not use your personal information for any purpose that is incompatible with the reason it was originally collected without first seeking your consent.

5. Research Participation and Data

If you participate in research activities connected to this project — including the Teachers Survey or Writers Survey — your data will be handled in accordance with the ethical standards of the University of Southern Queensland and the Australian Code for the Responsible Conduct of Research.

Participation is voluntary. Survey responses are stored securely and accessed only by the research team. Where findings are published or presented, data will be de-identified or aggregated so that individual participants cannot be identified, unless you have explicitly consented to being named. You may withdraw from research participation at any time without consequence.

6. Student Privacy

This website does not collect personal information directly from students. Where teachers share information about classroom experiences or student outcomes as part of research participation, no individually identifying student information is collected or stored. Any classroom images or examples of student work featured on this site are only published with documented consent from the relevant school, teacher, and parent or guardian, in line with applicable state and national legislation.

7. Disclosure of Your Information

We do not sell, rent, or trade your personal information. We may share information with third parties only in the following circumstances: with Google LLC for the purposes of website analytics via Google Analytics as described in Section 3 above; with USQ’s research administration systems and ethics oversight bodies as required; with service providers who help us operate this website, such as hosting providers, who are bound by confidentiality obligations; and where we are required to do so by law or in response to a legitimate legal process.

This website may include embedded content from third-party platforms such as videos or documents. When you interact with such content, the third-party platform may collect data about you in accordance with its own privacy policy.

8. Data Storage and Security

Your personal information is stored securely. We take reasonable steps to protect your information from unauthorised access, loss, or misuse. Data is retained only for as long as necessary for the purposes for which it was collected, or as required by law, and is then securely disposed of.

9. Your Rights

You have the right to request access to the personal information we hold about you, to request correction of any inaccurate or incomplete information, to request deletion of your personal information (subject to legal or administrative obligations that require us to retain it), and to withdraw consent for any data use that is based on consent.

To exercise any of these rights, please contact us using the details below. We will respond to your request within a reasonable timeframe.

10. Links to Other Websites

This website contains links to external sites, including resources hosted by other organisations. We are not responsible for the privacy practices of those sites and encourage you to review their privacy policies before providing any personal information.

11. Changes to This Statement

We may update this Privacy Statement from time to time to reflect changes in our practices or relevant legislation. When we make significant changes, we will update the “Last updated” date at the top of this page. We encourage you to review this statement periodically.

12. Contact Us

If you have any questions about this Privacy Statement, or if you wish to make a privacy-related request or complaint, please contact the Creative Arts Circles research team via our Contact Us page.

If you are not satisfied with our response to a privacy concern, you may also contact the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) at www.oaic.gov.au.