Dear Colleagues,
This is our last newsletter of the school year. In previous years we would have spent the last few months considering the changes that are being proposed in KCSiE for your return to school in September and how these are reflected in our template L2 slides and policy. Please ensure that you read the item below and please do get in touch with any of the team, should you have any questions.
For most there are several weeks until the end of term and for many these will be some of the busiest weeks of the school year. Please don’t hesitate to get in touch with us if we can be of help or support or if you’d like to discuss your needs for next year be that through training, a review, mentoring and coaching or a more bespoke package. We are already taking bookings for September 2024 INSET days! Finally, thank you in advance to all of you from the MASH team who pick-up the phone or attend strategy meetings during the summer holiday. This is greatly appreciated!
We look forward to seeing those of you that are coming to our annual conference on Thursday 29th June where we already have a record number of attendees. There are still a few places available so please visit our website if you’d like to look at further details and join us at Sandy Park along with our 4 keynote speakers.
Though what currently seems some way off, we hope that when you can, you find time over the summer break to find time to relax with friends and family.
As ever, thank you for all you do!
Jon Galling, Senior Education Safeguarding Officer
Keeping Children Safe in Education, Working Together to Safeguard Children, DES Model Safeguarding Policy and Level 2 Awareness PowerPoint
A draft of 2023 Keeping Children Safe in Education was released by the DfE on Tuesday 6th June. Having reviewed the changes listed in Annex F, there does not appear to be anything significant. We believe this is in part due to an expected update to Working Together 2018, likely to be later in the autumn term. Because of this and the possibility of changes to Working Together to Safeguarding Children (that may have implications for Education) we have decided to make minimal changes to our model safeguarding policy.
KCSiE 2023 (draft): There is a new guidance for Keeping Children Safe in Out of School Settings to support governors and proprietors in seeking assurance that the provider of activities concerned has appropriate safeguarding and child protection policies and procedures in place however the main focus for changes this year appears to be around filtering and monitoring and ensuring that staff know their part in this, and that the DSL is lead professional. Please ensure that this new responsibility is included in your job description if you are the DSL at your setting.
Having sought feedback we know that you would like revised model policies this term to avoid a rush to ratify policies in the autumn term. With that in mind we will not be making any huge changes to our model policy to make ratification this term easier for you all. However, in the autumn term we will be providing an updated model policy once we are aware of any significant implications for Education within any newly released Working Together to Safeguard Children.
For those of you planning your non pupil days in September please consider:
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Ensuring that staff and adults in school have received L2 Safeguarding Awareness Training. Here's our L2 Basic for Education Settings 2022 PowerPoint (Because there are no significant changes to KCSiE the basic PowerPoint on our website will remain the same however remember to add a slide on your settings filtering and monitoring systems and how staff report any breaches or concerns)
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When delivering L2 awareness training don’t forget to personalise to your settings/staff/pupils needs.
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Checking when staff last received updates on Prevent and deliver if required.
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Retaining evidence that all have read the necessary documents KCSiE part 1 alongside Annex B (or Annex A if appropriate), your safeguarding policy, whistleblowing policy, code of conduct and other safeguarding related policies and procedures.
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How staff and visitors are made aware of how to log a safeguarding concern and that they all know who the DSL and safeguarding team are.
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That new employees have had safeguarding induction before or on the first day of starting at your setting (and keep a record of this).
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Inviting volunteers and governors to any safeguarding training delivered at the beginning of the year.
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Checking our newsletters and bulletins so you receive information of our revised model safeguarding policy hot off the press in Autumn Term 1. Our next newsletter is due w/b 11th September.
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Take a look at the substantive changes in KCSiE and ensure that your policies, processes and job description reflect any changes e.g. reviewing your out of hours contracts and amending with the necessary details.
We will be adding the revised Safeguarding Model Policy for September 2023 on our website on Monday 19th June
Online pornography - informative podcast
SWGfL recently added a link to a podcast that DSLs and school leaders, including curriculum leads for PSHE and RSE will find very useful. Concerns around children accessing harmful pornographic content are becoming more and more understood. Schools continue to face challenges in creating opportunities to teach. Please remember that you can subscribe to SWGfL newsletters via their website.
Ofcom have released their annual report 'Children and Parents: Media Use and Attitudes', which introduces new insights into digital literacy, attitudes and understanding among children between the ages on 3-17. Their report includes information on how parents are monitoring and managing children’s digital usage, identifying important areas where parents and schools can improve children’s digital literacy.
The report data reveals that most young people are currently accessing the internet through mobile phones (69%) and tablets (64%). This new data demonstrates how prevalent online experiences are for children, and the need to make sure safeguarding tools are in place to support them online.
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While no two inspections follow the same pattern or questions, throughout the year, there are some trends that have become apparent in ensuring that safeguarding is both effective but also has a robust culture. We therefore hope that in sharing these, for those of you who are preparing for your next visit, the following list is a useful prompt.
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Seeking evidence of safeguarding training including sight of certificates of attendance for training such as L3 initial or most recent refresher, Safer Recruitment and when staff last had their L2 training.
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Ensuring that the school have completed S128 checks for relevant staff if an academy, independent or free schools and for governors, board members and trustees in all schools.
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Evidence of checks completed for employees who have lived or worked overseas for a qualifying period of time.
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Speaking with children to gain their understanding at an age and stage appropriate level how they learn what healthy relationships are and if they have concerns about the behaviour of other children/students that they can report these and that this will be investigated.
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Speaking with a variety of staff in roles such as meal-time assistants, site staff, those working in the school office or part-time staff as to their understanding of what they understand their safeguarding role is and about topics such as exploitation, whistleblowing and how they report any concerns.
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Reviewing the actions of the DSL and team where concerns have been reported to ensure that actions are appropriate, timely and in the child’s best interest.
- Where relevant, what challenge has there been in relation to the decisions made by Children's Social Care including where families are deescalated from CiN or CP plans where DSLs/School Leaders believe that there is still significant risk or where initial assessment is not deemed necessary following a MASH enquiry.
Please see below the important communication received from our local authority colleagues regarding updates to the ‘front door’ service:
'Dear Partners / Colleagues,
I’m emailing to inform you that we are updating our ‘front door’ services and as a result, the current Gateway service will no longer be operating from Monday 1st May. This is in order to improve our response in the MASH and Early Help Service to ensure that children and families receive the right response from the right service.
Depending on the support you need, there are now two key ways to contact the Plymouth City Council Children’s Services team. If you have safeguarding concerns about a child that requires a social worker please send the MASH contact form to mash@plymouth.gov.uk. If it is an urgent safeguarding concern, please make an immediate referral by phoning the Multi-Agency Safeguarding Hub (MASH) on 01752 668000, or 01752 346984 out of hours.
If you would like advice or guidance about a family or child you work with, please book a conversation with one of our Family Support Workers using our online form: Plymouth Early Help and SEND Advice line. We can offer support around issues such as emotional wellbeing, parenting guidance, school attendance, social and emotional development and SEND concerns using this service. Call backs are available from 9am to 4pm each weekday via the advice line and the booking form gives you the opportunity to choose a half-hour slot that works for you.
We are increasing our staff capacity for each of these contact options to ensure that both our Early Help Service and our MASH have appropriate resource to respond. We will send you posters with details of the new contact options in due course, and would be grateful if you can please share this information with your colleagues.
Plymouth Safeguarding Children Partnership Business Unit'
We have been asked to share the overview information for schools to view to update DSL and School Leaders understanding. We appreciate that this is a hugely sensitive and emotive topic.
The EMTAS team have developed a newsletter! Further information can also be found on the DES website.
Due to the DfE guidance Working Together to Improve School Attendance it is vital that school attendance remains a focus for us all, particularly around pupils with less than 50% attendance and vulnerable groups.
Please be aware that attendance newsletters will include updates around any changes in the Education Welfare Service and resources available to schools. Subscribe for future newsletters.
In line with the statutory functions we have within DCC, we would like to keep up to date with professionals within schools to allow ease of communication between schools and LA.
In order to do this we're asking schools to complete the form half termly. The information provided will be held centrally in Education and Learning to aid our service users to support/make contact with the correct personnel.
When completing the form, if the same staff member holds multiple roles, then please provide the same name and email in the appropriate role boxes.
Phil is the team leader for the Safer Recruitment Service, who has been in this role for many years, is retiring at the end of July. Many of you will have spoken or exchanged emails with Phil or colleagues from his team on topics such as DBS, advice and guidance on checks for overseas candidates and a whole host of other related topics. Phil’s support for schools alongside that of his team is greatly appreciated and respected, often in the middle of an inspection when an inspector is challenging a school's decision or process where his calm, swift and knowledgeable approach is always welcome!
We will continue to work closely with the team and Phil's successor Emily Sutcliffe but want to thank Phil for his huge contribution to safeguarding over many, many years.
Happy retirement Phil and Thank You!
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