- Who this covers
Ontario Secondary School Dancefest (“OSSDF,” “we,” “us”) runs an annual dance festival for Ontario secondary schools, and operates the online platform at ossdancefest.ca/app (“the Platform”) that schools use to register for it — dancer and choreographer sign-up, staff/chaperone registration, parent media consent, dance entry submission, judging, and event administration.
This policy applies to everyone who provides information through the Platform:- Students registering as a dancer and/or choreographer through a link their teacher shares
- Parents/Guardians completing the media release & consent form, either alongside their child or via an emailed link
- Teachers registering their school and managing its roster, entries, and invoices
- Staff & Chaperones registering to attend the live event
- Judges & Volunteers signing in with a Google account to score entries, tabulate results, or administer the event
It does not cover OSSDF’s own social media accounts or the separate public information site, if their content or forms differ from what’s described here. - What we collect
The only information we gather is for what we deem is needed to run the festival: get the right students into the right entries, feed them safely, reach a parent when consent is needed, and settle invoices with a school.
The information we gather in the Student/Participant registration includes:- Name, grade, email — to identify the participant and send registration reminders
- Role & experience level (Dancer / Choreographer / both; Novice through Advanced)
- T-shirt size — event merchandise
- Dietary restrictions / allergies — shared with the school and event caterers for accommodation planning
- Graduating status, first-time flags — program & award eligibility
- Parent/guardian name & email — provided by the student, to route the consent form
- Parent/guardian consent: Name, email, and an electronic signature confirming the media release and understanding of the participation fee — reached either in person alongside the student’s own registration, or via a one-time emailed link.
Teachers & school accounts: School name, address, board, principal’s name and contact, and the registering teacher’s own name, email, alternate email, and cell phone. A school account is issued a generated ID and password (stored only as a one-way hash — see the Security Information document).
Staff & chaperones: Name, email, phone, role, t-shirt size, and dietary restrictions — same accommodation purpose as participants.
Judges, tabulators, and admins: We use Google Sign-In for these roles. We receive your name and email address from Google to check you against an authorized list — we never see or store a password for these accounts.
Dance entries & music: Entry title, style, level, size, choreographer(s) and dancer(s) attached to it, and — if uploaded — the music file itself, stored securely for playback during judging. - Why we collect the information noted above:
Every field above exists to run one part of the festival: building the program and running order, matching dancers to the right award category, feeding participants safely, reaching a parent for legally-necessary consent, invoicing a school correctly, and letting judges score the right routine. We don’t use registration data for advertising, and we don’t sell it. - Who can see it
Access follows the same boundaries as the Platform’s login roles:- Your own school’s teacher(s) can see everything submitted for their students, staff, and entries — never another school’s.
- OSSDF Account & Event Admins (a small number of board volunteers) can see registration and payment status across all schools, to run the event and reconcile fees.
- Judges see an entry’s title, level, style, size, school, and the names of its dancers and choreographers while scoring — not contact information or dietary/medical notes.
- Tabulators see submitted scores and entry details, to compile results.
- Services we rely on:
Rather than building our own database, the Platform is built on a small number of established providers, each doing one job:
- Google (Sheets & Sign-In) — the underlying record-keeping for every registration, plus staff sign-in
- Resend — delivering registration, reminder, and parent-consent emails
- Cloudflare R2 — private storage for uploaded music files
- Each Platform is bound by its own privacy and security practices; none are permitted to use OSSDF’s data for their own purposes.
- Photo & video consent
Recordings and photographs of live performances are governed by the Media Release a parent or guardian signs during Parent Consent — not by registering alone. That form spells out exactly how footage may be shared with teachers and families, and under what conditions (if any) it may appear on ossdancefest.ca or OSSDF’s social channels. First names, never full names or contact details, may appear alongside that media. - How long we keep it
Registration records are kept for the festival season they were submitted for, and typically for a reasonable period after for award records, invoicing history, and year-over-year continuity (for example, recognizing a returning participant). If you’d like your information removed sooner, see “Your choices” below. - Students & minors
Most participants are secondary school students. Where a student is a minor, a parent or guardian completes the consent and media release step directly — that’s built into the registration flow itself, not an afterthought. We do not knowingly collect information from children under 13 outside of a school-supervised registration context, and dietary/allergy information is used solely for on-site accommodation. - Your choices
You can ask to see, correct, or delete information submitted about you or your child by contacting your school’s registering teacher (who can edit or remove a roster entry directly) or by emailing us at the address below. Parents may also revoke media consent by the same route, before the event footage is shared. - Changes & contact
If this policy changes in a way that meaningfully affects what we collect or how it’s used, we’ll update the effective date and note the change here. Questions, requests, or concerns about your information: ossdancefest@gmail.com
