LEA prepares for Freedom of Information Act

Like all local education authorities, Southwark LEA has to deal with large volumes of paper. Much of this paper consists of student records and needs to be archived for several years even after students have completed their studies at one of the Borough's colleges.

With space at a premium, the solution in the past has been to microfilm the data and maintain an archive within the LEA. However microfilm has many limitations and Gerri Savage of Southwark LEA wanted to offer a more streamlined and effective approach.

Records potentially need to be accessed by many different staff and so by scanning each file they were able to provide instant access on line to all the appropriate officers in the LEA. Around 200,000 records were scanned by Preview in a matter of days and will now be made available to staff via the LEA network.

This exercise helps the LEA to establish compliance under the Freedom of Information Act a legal framework that will affect all public authorities over the next two years.

Gerri Savage was delighted with the service from Preview and said "I contacted Preview to assist us with the project and they delivered on time and within our budget. The new faster access will significantly reduce the amount of time staff spend locating records and will improve the service we are able to offer our students"

www.southwark.lgfl.net