Acceptable Usage Guidelines

Quick Summary

When you use Study Work Grow and the Ponder platform, we want you to feel safe and informed. This guide explains your rights, our responsibilities, and the rules everyone needs to follow.

Your Personal Information

We only collect information we need to help you with career planning, and you have lots of control over your privacy.

What We Collect

• Your email address
• Your name (you can use a nickname if you prefer, but we need your real name for billing — this only applies if you or your family purchase anything from the shop, which is entirely optional)
• Information about your school or organisation
• How you use our platform (internally only — we don’t share this with any third parties)

Why We Collect It

• To give you access to career resources
• To send you helpful communications (only if you want them)
• To keep your account secure
• To improve our services

You have strong privacy rights with us. You can:

• See what information we have about you
• Ask us to fix incorrect information
• Ask us to delete your account and information
• Request a copy of your data in a portable format
• Use a nickname instead of your real name (except for billing)
• Opt out of communications anytime

We promise to:

• Only collect information we actually need
• Keep your information secure in Australian data centres
• Delete your personal data and account after 24 months if you haven’t logged in (though any anonymous research data already collected — which can never be linked back to you — will be retained, because it was never connected to your identity in the first place and cannot be extracted from aggregate datasets)
• Never sell your information to other companies
• Never share your information with third parties for marketing purposes (we may occasionally let you know about new Study Work Grow and Ponder tools and resources, but only if you’ve opted in to receive communications from us)

Account Rules

Use the platform responsibly for career planning, don’t share your login details, and be respectful to others.

What You CAN Do

• Access career resources, tools, and communications
• Share your account access with immediate family members
• Use the platform for school and personal career planning
• Contact us with questions or feedback

What You CAN’T Do

• Share your login details with friends or classmates
• Post inappropriate content (offensive, threatening, or adult material)
• Try to hack or break our platform
• Copy our content and share it publicly
• Pretend to be someone else
• Use the platform for anything illegal

Account Sharing Rules

• Each person needs their own account
• Don’t share usernames and passwords
• Only people in your school or organisation’s community can access your school’s subscription
• Your teachers and parents can help you with your account

Money and Membership

How It Works

If your school or organisation has a membership, your access is included as part of that — you don’t need to pay anything yourself. If you’re accessing individually, you or your family manage your own subscription or purchases.

• Subscriptions generally last for one year
• If bills aren’t paid, access might be suspended
• Individual purchases are paid at the time of purchase

If You’re Under 15

When you create your account, we’ll ask your age. If you’re under 15, you’ll need to check with your family and gain permission from a parent or guardian before you can use the platform. This is both for your safety and to follow the law. If you access the platform through your school, your school manages this through their usual consent processes.

Safety and Security

We work hard to protect your information, and you can help by using the platform responsibly.

We Protect You By

• Using secure servers in Australia
• Training our staff on privacy
• Having strict rules about who can access your information
• Regularly checking for security problems
• Not using any third-party tracking or advertising tools

You Protect Yourself By

• Not sharing your login details
• Using appropriate language and behaviour
• Reporting any problems to us
• Only sharing information you’re comfortable with us having

If Something Goes Wrong

There are clear processes for handling problems, whether you break the rules or we make a mistake.

If You Break the Rules

We might:

• Give you a warning
• Temporarily suspend your account
• Permanently remove your access
• Contact your school or organisation

We’ll always try to work with you to fix problems before taking serious action. However, if you communicate with us or use the platform in a way that is abusive, threatening, or uses obscene language, we may share your communications with your school or organisation.

If We Make a Mistake

You can:

• Email us at [email protected]
• Ask us to fix the problem
• Complain to the Australian Privacy Commissioner if it’s about privacy (oaic.gov.au), or the New Zealand Privacy Commissioner (privacy.org.nz), or the relevant privacy authority in your home country

If You Want to Leave

• Contact us to delete your account
• We’ll remove your personal information within 14 days
• Some information might be kept if required by law
• Any anonymous research data already collected cannot be removed because it was never connected to your identity

About the Information on Our Platform

Our platform includes information about occupations, industries, universities, TAFEs, employers, and other organisations. Here’s how that works:

• We choose what to include based on what’s useful for your career exploration — no one pays us to recommend one option over another
• We don’t do sponsored content or paid advertisements
• Sometimes we work with industries and organisations to create content together — they bring the expertise and we bring the learning design skills — but this doesn’t mean we’re recommending them over anyone else
• Organisations might pay to add extra content to their profile (like a video), but that just covers our costs to set it up — it doesn’t change how we present or rank information
• We include third-party information for free because we think you should have access to all the options, not just the ones that can afford to pay

Always do your own research too — check directly with universities, employers, or other organisations before making big decisions.

If You’re Taking an Assessment

Before you start any Assessment on our platform (such as a career quiz, survey, or exploration tool), here’s what you should know:

What Happens With Your Responses

• Your Assessment responses are stored completely separately from your personal information. Your name, email, and other identifying details are never attached to your responses.
• Each set of responses is identified only by a randomly generated anonymous code — it cannot be traced back to you.
• There are no open text fields stored as part of assessment data.

What We Use Anonymous Data For

• Understanding labour market trends and career interests (labour market intelligence)
• Improving career guidance and resources for young people
• Creating reports and research to advocate for better career outcomes
• Sharing aggregate statistics and de-identified datasets with researchers, educational institutions, and government bodies where this supports our mission of helping young people

How We Protect Your Privacy in Research

• We never publish, share, or analyse individual responses — only aggregate data
• Where the number of responses in a particular category is small enough that someone might possibly be identifiable, we apply minimum threshold limits to prevent this
• Anonymous data is never sold or shared for commercial purposes

Your Choices

• You will always receive your own personal results from any Assessment you complete
• Your participation in contributing anonymous data to our research dataset is voluntary — you can opt out by emailing us at [email protected]
• Opting out will not affect your ability to use Assessments or see your results
• Because the data is anonymous and was never connected to your identity, previously contributed data cannot be extracted from aggregate datasets if you opt out later

Important

• Assessment results are informational only — they are general suggestions and potential indications, not professional advice
• Results do not determine your access to services or make decisions about you
• We recommend talking to a career adviser, teacher, or other trusted adult about your results

Important Legal Stuff

We both have responsibilities to each other, and we’ll let you know if the rules change.

Our Responsibilities

• Provide the services we promise
• Keep your information secure
• Follow Australian privacy laws (and applicable international privacy laws)
• Give you accurate career information (but remember, it’s general guidance, not personal counselling)

Your Responsibilities

• Follow these rules
• Give us accurate information for billing (only if required)
• Tell us if something seems wrong
• Use the platform responsibly

Changes to These Rules

• We might update these rules sometimes
• We’ll give you at least 7 days’ notice of important changes
• By continuing to use the platform, you agree to any updates

Questions?

Need help? Email us at [email protected]

Want to read the full legal documents?

You can find our complete Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policy on our website.

Have a privacy complaint?

• Contact us first at [email protected]
• If you’re not happy with our response, contact the Australian Privacy Commissioner at oaic.gov.au, the New Zealand Privacy Commissioner at privacy.org.nz, or the relevant privacy authority in your home country

Remember: This guide explains the main points in simple language, but the full Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policy are the official legal documents. If you have questions about anything, just ask us.