Safeguarding
Safeguarding
At Saint Aidan’s Church of England High School, our priority is the safety, happiness and well-being of our whole school family. We take our role as safeguarding and child protection officers very seriously and we will always deal with safeguarding and child protection cases quickly, following full Lancashire County Council procedure and protocol.
The Department for Education (DfE) ‘Keeping Children Safe in Education’ (2023), states safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children is defined for the purposes of this guidance as:
· Protecting children from maltreatment;
· Preventing impairment of children’s mental and physical health or development;
· Ensuring that children grow up in circumstances consistent with the provision of safe and effective care; and
· Taking action to enable all children to have the best outcomes.
If you have ANY concern about a child’s safety or welfare, please do not hesitate in contacting Mr Anthony Lord (Deputy Headteacher and Designated Safeguarding Lead) or Mrs Kate Bray (Assistant Head and Deputy DSL) in school. We work with many agencies, as appropriate and necessary and we are an Operation Encompass school.
We are committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children and we expect all staff and volunteers to share this commitment.
Our Safeguarding and Child Protection governor is Mrs Kath Bell.
Safeguarding One Another
Derogatory and discriminatory language and actions have no place in school or society. At Saint Aidan’s, we celebrate diversity and inclusion and have clear policies and processes in place to protect all from any form of bullying. We regularly remind one another of this in lessons, worship, Personal Development lessons, Personal Development Days and in our general school life. Everyone has the right to feel safe and valued!
We should challenge anything we believe to be offensive and/or hurtful to any group or individual in school. All students, staff, parents, governors and wider members of the Saint Aidan’s community have a responsibility to call out and report anything that could be described as sexist, racist, disablist, homophobic or transphobic. Anything that makes another member of the Saint Aidan’s family feel upset, sad or unvalued is wrong.
Should you witness any behaviour of this sort, please bring it to the attention of the school. It is everyone’s duty to protect one another. You can report your concerns through any member of staff or via the dedicated email address: safeguarding@st-aidans.lancs.sch.uk
Operation Encompass
We are an Operation Encompass school which means that we are alerted, by the police, if they have visited a household where a child has witnessed domestic abuse or other serious incident. Information is shared as part of a multi-agency approach for the safety and wellbeing of children involved in or witnessing domestic abuse.
Safeguarding Policy
We have a number of policies and procedures in place that contribute to our safeguarding commitment, including our Safeguarding Policy, Drugs & Substance Misuse Policy and Anti-Bullying Policy. These, and others, can be viewed using the link below:
Sometimes we may need to share information and work in partnership with other agencies, when there are concerns about a child’s welfare. We will ensure that our concerns about our students are discussed with parents/carers first, unless we have reason to believe that such a move would be contrary to the child’s welfare. Our aim is to work in partnership with families, whenever possible to prevent concerns escalating to child protection issues. Early intervention is paramount. Please always come and talk to us if you have any concerns.
Prevent
We are a Prevent school. Prevent is a government strategy designed to stop people becoming terrorists or supporting terrorist or extremist causes.
The Prevent strategy covers all types of terrorism and extremism, including the extreme right wing, violent Islamist groups and other causes.
For further information, follow the link here:
Educational Visits and visitors
Joanne Rossall is our Educational Visits Coordinator.
All school trips are thoroughly risk assessed and uploaded to EVOLVE. The trip must be approved by Mrs Rossall and Mr Smith (non-residential visits) plus the School Governing Body and the Local Authority four weeks in advance for residential, adventurous or overseas visits.
Safeguarding for Students
Safeguarding is everyone’s responsibility, including students themselves. As such, at various times during the year, we will run sessions on specific aspects of safeguarding including mental health, substance misuse and healthy relationships. These will often take place during Personal Development Days and include input from experienced professionals.
Early Help Assessments
Early help is about receiving the right help at the earliest possible stage. It is a way that families, the school and other agencies can work together to improve things for all family members.
An Early Help Assessment can empower families to achieve change, recognising the family’s knowledge and expertise and including them as active participants in the process of identifying their strengths, needs and desired changes. Each stage of the assessment process, including the final action plan, is negotiated and completed in partnership between the family and practitioners.
An Early Help Assessment can prevent family members from having to repeat information to different professionals by recording this in a single document which, with consent, can be shared. Different practitioners working with a family can be requested to contribute to an assessment. Having an action plan brings clarity to who will be doing what to address the desired changes.
An Early Help Assessments consists of seven areas to be explored; Health, Education, Behaviour and Routines, Family and Community, Finances, Housing and Safety.
If a family no longer feel that their Early Help Assessment is needed, they can let the practitioners who are working with them know.
Further information and documentation can be found by clicking on the link below.
Early Help Assessment – information for professionals – Lancashire County Council
At Saint Aidan’s, we fully recognise the important role we play in protecting young people from harm and to support and promote the welfare of all who are registered pupils at our school. We are committed to working to establish and maintain an ethos where our students feel secure and are encouraged to talk and are listened to. We ensure that students know that there are adults in the school who they can approach if they are worried or are in difficulty and we include in the curriculum activities and opportunities to develop the skills which equip children to stay safe as well as helping them develop realistic attitudes to the responsibilities of adult life.
If students feel concerned about any school issues, they should approach their form tutor, Head of Year, the School Chaplain or the Pastoral Team in the Student Support Centre. They can also request support, or someone to talk to, by emailing wellbeing@st-aidans.lancs.sch.uk
Further Safeguarding assistance, help and advice can be accessed by contacting the following colleagues:
Anthony Lord (Deputy Headteacher/Designated Safeguarding Lead)
anthony-lord@st-aidans.lancs.sch.uk
Kate Bray (Assistant Headteacher/Deputy Designated Safeguarding Lead)
kate-bray@st-aidans.lancs.sch.uk
Faye Nowotarski (Behaviour Manager/Safeguarding Officer)
faye-nowotarski@st-aidans.lancs.sch.uk
Our Safeguarding Policy is available to read in our policies section or by clicking the link here: Saint Aidan’s Safeguarding Policy
Help and advice regarding online safety can be read in our designated section of the website or by clicking here: Online Safety