The Safeguarding and Child Protection Policy at Swinford Church of England Primary School is based on the Leicestershire County Council recommended policy and is updated annually and verified by the Full Governing Body. The updates reflect the changes to the county policy.

The key features of the Safeguarding policy are to:

• Provide children with a safe and secure environment;
• Ensure there are trusted adults children feel they can talk to;
• Ensure staff are aware of referral procedures;
• Access and act on advice from Leicestershire Child Safeguarding Board if there is any uncertainty as to the course of action required.

All staff, visitors and volunteers receive a safeguarding induction, and staff receive regular training and updates. 

Click here for our latest Safeguarding and Child Protection Policy.

The health and safety of all children is of paramount importance at Swinford Church of England Primary School. We recognise the moral and statutory responsibility of every member of staff to safeguard and promote the welfare of all pupils. We will be alert to the signs of abuse and maltreatment and will follow our procedures to ensure that children receive effective support, protection and justice.

If you have any safeguarding concerns about a child please speak to one of our Designated Safeguarding Leads (DSLs) - Mr O’Connor or Mrs Chamberlain.

It is also possible to contact the First Response Children’s Duty Team on 0116 305 0005 where you will be able to speak to a Social Worker about your worries or report it via the NSPCC https://www.nspcc.org.uk/keeping-children-safe/reporting-abuse/report/

The NSPCC has launched a dedicated helpline for children and young people who have experienced abuse at school, and for worried adults and professionals that need support and guidance, including for non-recent abuse. Call our new NSPCC helpline, Report Abuse in Education on 0800 136 663 or email help@nspcc.org.uk. 

If you are concerned about the safety of a child in school you can also contact us on dsl@swinford.embracemat.org
 

Parents send their children to school each day with the expectation that school provides a secure environment in which their children can flourish. In order to do this, a wide range of measures and policies are put in place. These are reviewed every year and are available:

• Child Protection

• Health and Safety

• Behaviour

• Anti-bullying

• Administration of medicines

Online safety statement

Embrace Multi Academy Trust takes a holistic approach to online safety. By ensuring that we utilise the latest technology to help us identify areas of concern and educating all young people about the safe use of online platforms, we strive to ensure that all pupils are not only safe within school but have the knowledge and skills to navigate online risks outside of the school environment.

Internet connections at our school are filtered using the cloud-based Securly platform, ensuring that internet access is both filtered and monitored no matter what devices are used.

Pupil activity on devices within the school is also monitored using one of the leading cloud solutions, Classroom.Cloud by Netsupport. This safeguarding and monitoring software helps to proactively identify any areas of concern and ensure pupil safety and welfare is monitored at all times. Alerts proactively notify staff should a pupil be in crisis and our Online Response Team and Designated Safeguarding Leads are quick to provide the support necessary.

Online safety is discussed and covered regularly in our school, both discreetly in the curriculum for Computing and PSHE, as well as being a regular topic for discussion in all curriculum areas.

Unless we give parents/carers prior notice of our intention to do so (for example, if we need to resurrect online teaching such as that which was taking place during the pandemic), pupils will never receive any direct electronic communication from staff members - this will always be done through parents/carers and only ever via our swinford.embracemat.org email accounts.

If you have any concerns whatsoever, please do not hesitate to get in touch with the school via admin@swinford.embracemat.org

Domestic violence and abuse

All Leicester City and Leicestershire County schools are part of Operation Encompass which is a safeguarding initiative aimed at improving outcomes for children and families affected by domestic violence and abuse. Operation Encompass is a protocol whereby schools are formally notified of any reported incident of domestic violence at an address at which children are present or normally resident. It is run in partnership with Leicester City Council, Leicestershire County Council and with Leicestershire Police. All public agencies currently share information where there are safeguarding concerns or risk of harm to children and the Police now share information about all incidents of domestic abuse through Operation Encompass.

To further support the welfare of children, when any domestic abuse incident has been reported to the Police during the school term and one of our pupils was in the household, the information is shared with the Designated Safeguarding Lead. This system has been introduced because domestic abuse in a household can have a huge impact on children, even if they do not see what is happening. This information will be used to ensure the school is able to provide appropriate support to pupils. The information will remain confidential and will only be shared on a strictly need-to-know basis. For example, with the class teacher. It will not be shared with children.

If you would like to speak to someone in confidence about domestic abuse, call the Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland Domestic Abuse Helpline on 0800 802 0028. If you need to make a silent call to the police, please dial 999 and then 55 which indicates to the officer that you are not safe to talk.