Effective management of school records and data is vitally important. It enables businesses to run efficiently and ensures compliance with obligations under the Data Protection legislation and the Freedom of Information Act 2000.
The Information and Records Management Society website has some very useful resources that you may wish to look at.
Schools may subscribe to the Information and Records Management Society (IRMS) which maintains School and Academy Toolkits that include retention guidance for all types of records relating to schools.
Details about School Affiliate Membership can be found on the IRMS website
The toolkit contains retention guidelines for school records and includes statutory retention periods, as well as advising on retention of documents for which there isn't a statutory timescale set.
Reasoning behind retention of records – for example statutory or business need – must be documented within a schools / academy’s own retention schedule.