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Sharon Allen - Consent Form - Students - Focus Group 19th June 2025 - UPDATED

Focus Group 19th June 2025

School Life and the Future 13-14s Student Focus Group

Parental Consent Form

My name is Sharon Allen, I’m am independent researcher, working with Hopscotch Consulting on behalf of our client to understand what young people think about school life, their future plans and useful skills for life. Your child has been selected to take part in this focus group, as they are currently aged 13 or 14 years old and studying in a state based school in England.

Sharon Allen Research will conduct a 1.5hour focus group for your child to participate in, and they will receive a £50 incentive payment for taking part in this research.

I would like to take this opportunity to reassure you that Sharon Allen has been checked and authorised by the Disclosure Barring Service (DBS, formerly known as the Criminal Records Bureau or CRB).

What to expect from the focus group

The session will involve us talking with your child and up to 7 other students, in a group discussion via Teams. The focus group will take up to 90minutes. Two or three clients may also attend to observe what people are saying in the group. They are just there to watch and won't take part in any of the conversations.

The purpose of the focus group is understand more about your childs experience of going to school, how their school approaches learning non-academic skills, and your child’s thoughts about what they will do in the future after leaving school.

We ask that you have access to a good internet connection to ensure your child can take part throughout the whole 90 minutes of the focus group. Please also ensure they can log in via desktop, laptop or tablet, rather than a phone, and keep the camera turned on throughout the group, so that they can see everyone else on the same screen. Please ask them to come fully engaged to the focus group, and turn off all other digital distractions – and not to email or message other people, or look at other apps or programs whilst the group is running,

Payment

Take Part in Research (who recruited your child for this focus group) will share your bank details with Sharon Allen so she can process your child’s £50 BACS incentive. Sharon will process the bank transfer within 14 days of the group taking place, so long as your details have been received by the date of the focus group.

The information we record

During the focus group, we will audio and video record the session via Teams, and use an AI transcription service (Granola or Otter) to make a transcription of the group. We use these recordings to help us remember what you tell us, and help us to tell a story about what is happening.

Who else will see it

Anything we do record will be anonymized, so anything said will not be traceable back to your child. None of the recordings will be made public and will only be used by Sharon Allen and the client team overseeing the project. After we have anonymized them, we might share snippets of what your child has told us through quotes with our client, to help us tell a story about what is happening.

How long we keep your information

Sharon Allen is responsible for any information you give us throughout the project. Any recordings will be stored in our secure One Drive. We will delete all recordings in which you could be directly identified within 6 months.

Privacy Policy

Alongside what is described in this consent form, we have included Sharon Allen’s Privacy Policy, explaining more about how we use any data collected.

The right to change your mind

You have the right to change your mind about what we do with your childs information, or to withdraw from the research entirely at any point and for any reason. If you want to change your mind, send an email to [email protected].

If you have any questions or would like more information about the research we are doing, please send an email to Sharon Allen on the email address above.

Agreeing to take part in the research

By signing this consent form you agree to the following:

Sharing your and your childs personal data (including contact and bank details) with the researcher, Sharon Allen, for the purposes of contacting you if required during the set up of this focus group, and to facilitate the incentive payment for participation in the research
Clients viewing the focus group
The focus group being audio recorded
The focus group being video recorded
The focus group being trascribed

Please confirm the following details about your child