Updated on 17/04/2020
The UK government has published new guidance on keeping children safe while schools are closed.
The guidance applies to:
- All schools, academies, independent schools and pupil referral units
- Any other further education providers funded by the Education and Skills Funding Agency
- Further education colleges
- Independent learning providers
- Institutions for further education
- Post 16 institutions
- Sixth-form colleges
- 16 to 19 academies.
The guidance says that schools and colleges must continue to follow the Keeping Children Safe In Education (KCSIE) statutory safeguarding guidance. It also sets out extra guidance to follow because of the coronavirus crisis.
We’ve summarised the new guidance so you can make sure your school or institution is keeping up-to-date.
Child Protection Policy
All schools and colleges must review and revise their child protection policies. You may need to include an extra ‘coronavirus section’ to your policy that sets out any changes you make in response to the current situation.
Your new section should mention any changes you’ve made to your processes because of coronavirus. This should include:
- Updated advice from your local authority relating to children with Education, Health and Care (EHC) plans, the local authority designated officer and children’s social care
- How staff should report their concerns about a child
- How pupils should raise any concerns they may have
- How you will deal with peer on peer abuse
- Arrangements to support children that your school or college are concerned about but who aren’t classed as ‘vulnerable’
- Arrangements to keep children you’re concerned about safe and who aren’t attending school.
It’s important you make all your staff and volunteers aware of your new policy and you must keep them up-to-date if you revise it. You’ll also need to make your policy publicly available (like putting it online) so that parents or carers of children can see it.
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Designated safeguarding leads (DSLs)
The government’s new guidance recognises that it’s not always possible to have a trained DSL or deputy on site at your institution. There are two new options you can take if this is the case:
1. A trained DSL or deputy should be available for people to contact by telephone or video call
2. Sharing a DSL or deputy with other schools or colleges - the DSL should also be available to contact by phone or video
Whichever option you choose, a senior leader should always be responsible for coordinating safety at your institution at all times.
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Vulnerable children
Children with a social worker should attend their usual school. This should only stop happening if the child’s social worker and family agree that it’s not in the child’s best interests. A risk assessment should be completed (the local authority and school should decide together who is best to complete this) to help inform this decision.
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Attendance
Local authorities and schools don’t need to complete their usual day-to-day attendance process for children they know aren’t coming to school. If a child is supposed to be at school but doesn’t attend, you must follow up with their parent or carer. To help with this, you should check all your emergency contact numbers for schools are up-to-date.
In all circumstances, if a vulnerable child doesn’t come to school or college, you must notify their social worker if they have one.
The Department of Education (DfE) has introduced a daily online attendance form to keep a record of children of critical workers and vulnerable children who are attending school. This allows schools to keep a record of attendance for safeguarding purposes. It also helps schools provide accurate, up-to-date data to the department on the number of children taking up places.
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Staff training and safeguarding induction
To cope with the small number of staff available at schools and colleges, staff may need to move between different schools on a temporary basis.
All new staff should continue to get safeguarding induction and training. If you’re getting new staff, you can judge the level of training to give on a case-by-case basis. In most cases, staff should have the right level of training but it’s best to always make sure.
You should also give any new staff a copy of your child protection policy. You should also explain any local processes they might not know, this includes your and DSL arrangements.
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Children moving schools and colleges
If any of your pupils are going to another school or college, you should give the new school any welfare and child protection information on that child.
If a child is vulnerable and going to a different school, you must, where possible, give the new school:
- The child’s EHC plan, if they have one
- Information on whether a child needs an EHC plan put in place
- The child’s protection plan
- The child’s personal education plan
- The details of the child’s social worker or their virtual school head (VSH).
Of course there may be GDPR concerns with sharing information about a child with other schools and colleges. The government has stated that it is appropriate to share information for the purpose of keeping a child safe during this crisis.
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Safer staff and volunteer recruitment and moving staff around
If you’re recruiting new staff or volunteers, you should continue to follow the relevant safer recruitment processes in line with the KCSIE guidance.
You should not leave a volunteer who has not had a Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) check unsupervised or allowed to work in a school or college under any circumstances.
You don’t need to carry out DBS checks on staff already working and who’ve already had a DBS check. If they move to another school temporarily, they also don’t need another DBS check.
All DBS checks have a specific category that states the type of institutions where a staff member is allowed to work. During the coronavirus crisis, this category should not stop qualified staff from moving to other types of institutions to help where they can.
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Mental health
Negative experiences and distressing life events, such as the current circumstances, can affect the mental health of pupils and their parents.
Teachers should be aware of this, and manage their pupil’s workload so that they’re not overwhelmed in the coming months.
Where schools are providing for children of critical workers and vulnerable children on site, they should ensure appropriate support is in place for children.
The DfE’s guidance on mental health and behaviour in schools sets out how mental health issues can cause changes in a young person’s behaviour or emotional state. These changes can be displayed in different ways, and that can be an indication of an underlying problem. Read the guidance on mental health and behaviour in schools.
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Online safety in schools and colleges
It will be more important than ever for schools and colleges to provide a safe environment, including online, for your pupils.
As a school or college, you should continue to ensure that appropriate filters and monitoring systems are in place. This is to protect children when they’re online on the school or college’s IT systems or recommended resources. Read more about filtering and monitoring guidance for your pupils.
You should consider who in your institution has the technical knowledge to maintain safe IT arrangements. You should also put a plan in place if that person becomes unavailable during this crisis for whatever reason.
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Online safety outside schools and colleges
You should still think about the safety of your pupils when they’re asked to work online from home. This could mean you need to update your existing policies to reflect the new reality of so many children (and in some cases staff) working remotely online.
Staff must follow that same behavior policy, or code of conduct, while teaching online that they would follow in a normal school setting. Your policy should already include things like:
- Acceptable use of technologies
- Staff and pupil relationships
- Communication between staff and pupils, including through social media.
You should update your policies if you need to include new online and distance learning arrangements that you’ve introduced because of coronavirus. This should include clear reporting routes for pupils so they can raise any concerns they have while at home.
You should also make sure that any online learning tools and systems you’re using are in line with privacy and data protection requirements.
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Useful links
Read the latest government guidance.
Contact our education law specialists if you need help or have questions about the government’s guidance. Call us on 0370 1500 100 or contact us online.
Go to our IMeducate page to find out more on how we can help your educational institution.
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