Safeguarding at Percy Hedley School

Safeguarding children and protecting them from harm is everyone’s responsibility. Everyone who comes into contact with children and families has a role to play.

Safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children is :

Providing help and support to meet the needs of children as problems emerge
Protecting children from maltreatment, whether that is within or outside the home, including online
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

Useful Links

How to Spot County Lines >

Child Poverty Report >

Online Mobile Safety >

Working Together to Safeguard Children 2023 Statutory Guidance >

What to do if you're worried a child is being abused >

What Our Parents Say

“Consistency of staff and great compassion and care as well as learning, help my son to feel safe and secure at school.”

“My child loves school, it is a place where they feel safe to be themselves, and this is celebrated by staff.”

What Our Students Say

“I feel safe at school if I am worried, I can talk to my teachers and friends.”

“I was really unhappy in my last school; I didn’t feel listened to, and I didn’t feel safe to be the real me. At Percy Hedley I can be who I want to be and feel happy to talk to the staff about things that worry me.”

Safeguarding Within Our Curriculum

Our school has three curriculum pathways followed by our pupils, these curriculums are underpinned by our three Key Drivers: Communication, Wellbeing and Independence. Our school values of Respect, Teamwork and Resilience are also at the heart of our curriculums.

Our curriculums are designed to ensure that our pupils are explicitly taught to keep themselves safe within school, at home, in the community and within their life going forward, in the most appropriate way for the pupils.

Please see the below document for a detailed view of how safeguarding is embedded within our curriculums, for all of our students.

Click here >

Working with Our Pupils

The Safeguarding team have been working with our Student Council to update the documents that we use to keep our pupils safe. We worked with them to design and create two new ‘Pupil Friendly’ versions of our policy documents, listening to their ideas and comments to ensure they were fit for purpose.

The documents have now been introduced to classrooms to support pupils with keeping safe in school, and knowing who their trusted adults are.

We have also worked with our therapy team in school to create other documents for school to ensure all pupils know the communications to keep themselves safe. These will be used in areas of personal care and within classrooms.

You can see the documents below:

Pupil Friendly Anti-Bullying Guidance >

Pupil Friendly Safeguarding Guidance >

More Pupil Friendly Safeguarding Guidance >

Signs and Symbols to Keep me Safe >

School Site Safety Map

This term we have worked with our student council to complete a school site safety map, looking at areas of school which make them feel unsafe or nervous. We talked through the areas, made a key and worked with them to produce a safety map to present to the Maintenance team and SLT using pupil voice. We have now actioned many of the points and pupils have been fed back to about these. We will complete the exercise again in the Autumn term to ensure we know our pupils feel safe in all areas of school. Updates around our actions from this will feature on the school blog.

Pupils decided that the key for the map would be:

Red – I feel unsafe

Orange – I feel very nervous

Blue – I sometimes feel nervous here dependent upon other factors

Green – I feel safe.

You can see the map we created here >

Safeguarding Letters

Every term a safeguarding letter is produced for parents and carers, see past issues below:

Safeguarding Letter - Spring 2024 >

Safeguarding Letter - Autumn 2023 >

Safeguarding Letter - Summer 2023 >

Safeguarding Letter - Spring 2023 >

Safeguarding Policy

All Percy Hedley School staff  receive appropriate safeguarding and child protection training (including online safety) at induction; all staff receive safeguarding and child protection (including online safety) updates, as required, and at least annually, to provide them with relevant skills and knowledge to safeguard children effectively. All staff have clearance to work with children through enhanced DBS in addition to checks on prohibitions, sanctions and restrictions that might prevent the individual from taking part in certain activities or working in specific positions.

We have clear procedures in place to report any concerns (CPOMS). We also teach our learners to keep themselves safe, both within the school grounds and in the wider world. We work closely with parents and wider multi agency teams to ensure that there is clarity and understanding of our procedures in relation to child protection.

View Our Safeguarding Policy >

Ask Us Anything In Confidence About Safeguarding

Please use the link below to ask us a question about all things safeguarding, your questions come to the safeguarding team only and we will answer or signpost you to the most relevant information. If you would like a personal response please include the relevant contact details. If not questions will be used anonymously to complete a FAQ’s section within the blog and the website. If you do not want yours to appear in this just let us know.

Please use the link at the top of the form to change the language or use the text to speech button to support accessibility within your responses.

Please ask us anything via this form >

Online Safety

E-safety and child safety online is also a key feature of the work we do to keep our young people safe.

Policies and Procedures

Take a look at all of our policies and procedures in our documents center.

See Our Policies >

Curriculum

Check out our child-centered, unique curriculum designed to suit the needs of each individual child.

Find Out More >

Prevent Duty

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 political and religious extremism.

Learn More >

Safer Recruitment

Safer recruitment is a set of practices to help make sure our staff and volunteers are suitable to work with children and young people. It’s a vital part of creating a safe and positive environment and making a commitment to keep our students safe from harm.

Learn more >

Domestic Violence and Operation Encompass

See what Domestic Violence and Operation Encompass is, whilst accessing some useful links and documents.