Safeguarding

Safeguarding during COVID January 2021

Safeguarding at Leechpool Primary School

Leechpool Primary School is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children and young people and expects all staff, volunteers and the wider community to share this commitment. For pupils to feel that they are able to do their best and achieve their true potential, it is important that they feel safe and supported in our school environment.

Everyone working within our school, whatever their role is acutely aware that issues to do with the protection of children are of the highest possible importance. Trust underpins everything that we do in school. The parents of our pupils entrust the care of their children to us and together we are all responsible for their well-being.

We ensure that our pupils feel secure, are encouraged to talk, are listened to and are safe. Throughout our curriculum, we provide activities and opportunities that equip our children to stay safe and develop essential life skills.

Leechpool Primary School aims to ‘prevent’, ‘protect’ and ‘support’ all its pupils by addressing child protection in the curriculum, pastoral activities and in the management of the school, and by empowering and enabling staff to be vigilant for vulnerable students through regular, on-going training and the dissemination of information. We also involve our pupils in regular assemblies with visiting agencies and workshops which will enable them to stay safe online, in school and at home.

The Governors ensure that our main safeguarding policies are reviewed and updated each year as well as undertaking a regular Health and Safety walks around the premises to highlight any hazards or deterioration in equipment/furnishings.

A safeguarding audit each year ensures our systems meet statutory guidelines and, in many cases, going beyond basic requirements. We receive advice and guidance from the Local Authority and all staff receive Level 1 Safeguarding training regularly with additional updates in staff meetings at least annually. All staff in school have undergone DBS scrutiny (Disclosure and Barring Checks).

Where there is any concern about the wellbeing/safeguarding of a pupil in school this is referred to the Local Authority MASH (Multi Agency Safeguarding Hub) team for advice, support and further action where required. 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 pupils are discussed with his/her parents/carers first unless we have reason to believe that such a move would be contrary to the child's welfare.

Our Governors are involved in overseeing and guiding our Safeguarding procedures and work to ensure the highest standards of safety, awareness and support for our pupils, staff and families.

We have a number of policies and procedures in place that contribute to our safeguarding commitment, including our Child Protection Policy which can be viewed in the Policies section of our website.

We actively support the Government's Prevent Agenda to counter radicalism and extremism.

Our Designated Safeguarding Lead (DSL) for all Safeguarding and Child Protection issues is Mrs Nicola Davenport. Our Deputy DSLs are Miss Emma Payne (Assistant Headteacher – Inclusion and Achievement), Mr Robert Cooper (Assistant Headteacher - Curriculum and Assessment) ,Mr Sam Chapman (Senior Teacher Part-time) and Mrs Wendy Tye (Phase Leader), Mrs Michelle Letley (Learning Mentor/HLTA) and Mrs Pippa Asprey (School Support) We undergo Statutory training every 2 years in order to ensure we adhere to West Sussex procedures and that pupils are safe at all times.

A useful link for Families and Parents is:

The Pantosaurus programme which has been around for a while but it is now supported with a TV advert and resource for parents. It can all be found here; https://www.nspcc.org.uk/preventing-abuse/keeping-children-safe/underwear-rule/