Catch up with the latest in safeguarding for schools: best practice, thought leadership, and all the latest insights within single central record management.

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When school management & policymakers talk about safeguarding in schools, one aspect that could use more attention and resources is the safety of children in schools who are known to be more vulnerable due to their identities. This goes for most marginalised identities, but in this article, we discuss one identity that isn’t always as visibly different: our LGBTQ+ children. 

For students who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, asexual, or questioning (LGBTQ+), the school and university can be a crucial place and period. It’s a time when they are exploring their identity and understanding it themselves. But they’re also soft targets for bullying, harassment, discrimination, assault and other negative treatments. 

UK Charity Stonewall reports that two in five LGBT students (42%) have hidden their identity at university for fear of discrimination. 7% of trans students have been physically attacked by another student or member of university staff in the last year. A plethora of worrying accounts have been recorded, of students facing discrimination and a lack of inclusion because of their sexual orientation or gender identity. 

Such kinds of bullying are unfortunately still a daily reality for many LGBTQ children and schools are often the first place they experience these things. With the online modes being so rampantly used, the manner and mode of such bullying changes — children can even be targeted anonymously — and it can get increasingly complex, targeted, or brutal.

Incidents and experiences like these take a mental and emotional toll. They can also be disruptive to a child’s learning and safety. This is why LGBTQ+ safety should form a core part of our safeguarding policies.  

Over the past few years, some progress has been made: 64% of LGBTQ+ students mentioned they are comfortable being open about their identity at school. 82% shared that they are confident about being more open about their sexual orientation or gender at university. As for the impact of their gender identity and expression on the educational experience, 9 out of 10 LGBTQ+ students reported having a good or neutral experience so far. Three-fourths of them attributed this comfort to acceptance by their peers. 

Today, educational institutions have a far greater awareness of the issues and are keen to create a safe environment where LGBTQ+ children can thrive. For this, there needs to be a safe space policy, in addition to school facilities, sensitisation drives, anti-discrimination and anti-bullying campaigns shared spaces and other initiatives. 

The design of all these initiatives should be made with the involvement of LGBTQ+ children. It’s called a lived experience approach and helps to ensure that our policies really benefit the ones they are intended to help. The principle is simple: Who can tell us better about the issues faced by LGBTQ+ youth than LGBTQ+ youth themselves? With that in mind, let’s look at how we can make our schools better places for LGBTQ+ children. 

We can start small. Share this response template with all members of the staff if they are made aware of any instance of bullying or harassment against LGBTQ+ children. This includes reports about comments that may not have been directed at one person in particular, but that can negatively impact children who identify as LGBTQ+. 

Understand the situation, try to deal with it without much panic. It’s best if such incidents are resolved privately.

Get all the facts together. Who all were involved as spectators and who was targeted by whom? Find out exactly what happened and try to verify from different sources. 

Make space for listening. Calmly dedicate some time, give attention to everyone. Remember, children might be feeling particularly vulnerable right now. 

Then respond by repeating the facts of the incident, specifying the issues with the behaviour, and affirming that it was harmful or hurtful. 

Act according to the school/classroom policy: what does the policy suggest as a lesson? What are the consequences? Use this as a teachable moment for others too. Bring home the value of kindness. 

Beyond the immediate response and a guiding policy, there should also be tangible sources of help for LGBTQ+ children in the school. Mental health counsellors at school can be one of the most important support resources. In the past year, nearly half of LGBTQ youth wanted to seek mental health counselling. They also look for spaces and practices that affirm their identity. These positive affirmations are very important, especially for children in the formative stages of their lives. Access to such resources should also be easy and confidentiality should be assured. 

The language we use also influences the outlook towards different identities. Time and again, LGBTQ+ students have shared their distress at the demeaning remarks made at their expense, like the word “gay” being used in a negative or derogatory manner. 

So much of the teaching is also done in archaic ways. Using a gendered language, not using inclusive pronouns while referring to children, or upholding gender binary in the educational contexts also deprives marginalised identities to be included in a classroom as equal to their peers. So, language training should be imparted, but the training shouldn’t just be superficial or reactive. Instead, it should look at the nuances of the situational contexts where LGBTQ children might feel endangered or unsafe and proactively work to change old ways of communication.

Simple things can make a huge cultural shift: calling young people by the name and pronouns they want to use and ensuring your school policies are trans-inclusive.

Collaborate with External Training Providers & Nonprofits

To that effect, it might be a good option to consider collaboration with external entities who specialise in imparting such kinds of training. Jake Kelly, Joint Head of Youth Service, Gendered Intelligence, a UK charity, shares, “At Gendered Intelligence we run a mentoring service for trans, non-binary and gender exploring young people in their educational setting — from primary through to higher education. The aim of this work is to support young people to attend, achieve and enjoy.” 

He adds, “the GI mentoring service is able to offer a holistic look at the trans, non-binary or gender exploring young person's needs within an educational setting. As part of this service, we also offer support and guidance to the educational establishment around supporting their students. Our approach is to work with the young person and the key professionals in their place of education, thus taking the onus away from the child/young person to have to explain and educate the adults around them as to what they need to be able to thrive in their education.”

What else can school leaders and management do to ensure safeguarding for trans and non-binary children and young people? Kelly adds, “Management and school leaders are best placed to make decisions about trans and non-binary student access to suitable changing and toilet facilities. We would suggest considering creating one uniform policy with non-gendered items, rather than putting clothes in boys’ and girls’ columns. This allows students to choose the clothing which is most comfortable for them as an individual.”

This extends to the times when a safeguarding or child protection issue is being considered that involves a trans or non-binary student. Be thoughtful about the details of a young person’s identity/name/pronoun/transition/physicality and whether or not these are to be disclosed. 

The Trevor Project’s Coming Out: A Handbook for LGBTQ Young People covers a wide range of topics to support LGBTQ young people in exploring what coming out safely can mean for them.

The Trevor Project’s Guide to Being an Ally to Transgender and Nonbinary Youth covers a wide range of topics and best practices on how to support transgender and nonbinary people, including the basics of gender, forms of address that show respect, common mistakes and what to do if you’ve made one.

The Trevor Project’s How To Support Bisexual Youth: Ways to Care for Young People Who Are Attracted to More Than One Gender covers best practices for supporting bisexual youth, including the basics of multisexual identities, sexual vs. romantic orientations, preventing bisexual erasure and biphobia, navigating gender and bisexuality, exploring different relationship types, and self-care tips.

Stonewall’s LGBTQ+ inclusive books for children and young people. A hand-selected list of LGBTQ-inclusive books for children and young people to enjoy. 

In this webinar we will look at the key safeguarding areas for consideration this academic year and how to maximise the effectiveness of strategic safeguarding work. 

We will consider how safeguarding leads and senior leaders can embed safeguarding across the school and link all aspects of school life together to ensure that safeguarding and the promotion of welfare is at the heart of all practice. 

We will look at the cornerstones of safeguarding practice, including opportunities for training, parental engagement, record keeping and policy development. 

The webinar will include lots of practical tips and strategies and has been designed to help attendees develop an annual plan for developing safeguarding practice – whether they are DSLs, headteachers, governors, business managers or trustees.

Join us and our Guest Panelist, Safeguarding Specialist Elizabeth Rose, as she provides essential safeguarding updates for the year.

Strategic Safeguarding Development: Strategies for Driving Forward Practice

Strategic Safeguarding Development Webinar

SCR Tracker | Strategic Safeguarding Development Webinar

SCR Tracker Slides.pdf

SCR Tracker Slides

Strategic Safeguarding Development - Slides.pdf

Strategic Safeguarding Development Slides

In the UK and elsewhere in the world, we are seeing children and young people return to early years, schools, and colleges gradually and will continue to see more educational settings opening up in the coming weeks. While it’s exciting for them to be able to join back their social circles in person, this inevitably also brings concerns about their safety and wellbeing.

Safeguarding has now become a part of our phraseology as the pandemic has created or deepened many vulnerabilities in our systems, disrupted schooling schedules, and added novel responsibilities for the staff. Children’s experiences of the pandemic have been very varied — they might have been safely isolating at home, or the past year might have been challenging, grief-ridden or traumatic. As children return to school, it’s important to acknowledge these differences and how they’ll impact their progress going forward. 

There is also a need to put safeguarding measures in place that will ensure the physical as well as mental safety of the children. At the same time, the staff, especially the safeguarding leadership, will confront unprecedented challenges in the process. Their well-being, too, needs to be prioritised. 

In this blog, we enumerate some safeguarding measures and wellbeing provisions that can help ensure safety in schools in a holistic manner. 

In order to address how the mental health of children and staff has been impacted, it’s important to understand the various possible ways the past 18 months may have impacted them. Some children may have gone through a direct loss during this time, like losing a relative to the virus or other illnesses, or witnessing a close relative/friend go through a tough period of ill-health or hospitalisation.

For others, the loss may look different: parents who were furloughed or lost jobs (and in turn took to unhealthy coping mechanisms), families that moved homes, and more. The impact of long-term isolation from relatives, extended family, and friends can also weigh heavy on children.

"This", Kate Young, founder of the Safeguarding Association, reminds us, "could have led to a lot of children who previously weren’t even on the radar now falling into the vulnerable category. My main suggestion is to identify who these vulnerable young people are, finding a way to identify them without compromising their safety, also helping them self-identify, and then making the information on support resources readily available,” she adds. 

Information about how the mental healthcare support at school works can be key in making newly vulnerable children comfortable about reaching out for help or opening up about their issues. This would entail looking out for less obvious signs of distress like children seeming withdrawn, uncharacteristically irritable, angry or confused. Children will also respond to grief differently. There should be robust processes in place to support students through this time as well as awareness amongst the children about the support they have available. One of these without the other will make the safeguarding plan ineffective.

Cruse Bereavement Support has a range of resources that can be helpful for the school staff to support children, including a guide on creating a school bereavement policy.

Under normal circumstances, school staff are able to identify vulnerable children through cues from their behaviour and other warning signs. Now, vulnerable children (especially the newly vulnerable ones) may have fallen through the cracks created by the changed mode of learning and teaching.

Young shares her number one concern from the past 18 months: that the rapport-building of the staff with parents was interrupted: 

“We’ve only seen parents online, so the school staff don’t have a relationship with them, and, therefore, cannot make judgement calls on whether a particular situation is risky and what level of risk is being held because they don’t have the background information on the family that they would ordinarily have. This gap is especially true for parents whose children have been in the school for just 2 years. There’s a huge piece of the puzzle missing there. For safeguarding, being able to build that trust with families quickly is important.” 

In line with that, it’s important for schools to devise a plan where they can get to know the children and their families better. We need to get to know them before we can support them with their needs, understand who they are, what they’re struggling with, what their vulnerabilities are, what the risk factors look like. This plan should involve measures to help identify the vulnerable groups and also sharing information and resources so they can self-identify. 

Another aspect of children returning to schools is anxiety around rejoining social spaces, starting social interactions again, and feeling safe with respect to infection. Karen Liebenguth, an accredited mindfulness teacher and supervisor & founder of Green Space Coaching & Mindfulness shares some tips on how to stay calm and grounded as we return to school, useful for both staff as well as the students.

Pause 5 times daily to take 3 deep breaths (it takes about 20 seconds): Set your alarm or remind yourself with a post-it note. Connecting with the body and breath in this way activates the parasympathetic nervous system that lets the brain know that you are safe; it brings you back into your direct sensory experience (primary experience), into the here and now where we can feel safe, grounded and calm. It’s a direct antidote to spiralling off in our head (secondary experience) which activates the sympathetic nervous system, the alarm system (amygdala) of the brain.

Take regular mindful breaks (before you need one): Taking regular breaks keeps you resourceful, creative and productive throughout the day vs feeling completely exhausted and overwhelmed at the end of the day. Breaks do not have to be long. Just a 2-minute break and several during the day can make a big difference.

For school staff, she suggests an informal system of work buddies: 

“Ask a colleague to be your work buddy and arrange to talk with each other regularly. Share how your work has been, what you’ve managed to do, what you’ve found challenging. Avoid going into catastrophic thinking together. Help each other come back to primary experience, to what’s actually going on, in the here and now. Find out what you need and how you can best support each other.”

Support your leadership & DSLs in their work and emotional wellbeing

In addition to resources and exercises for self-help, the school leadership and Designated Safeguarding Leads (DSLs) need to be thoughtfully supported through more hands-on professional and emotional support. They will be looking at supporting vulnerable children with different needs from a variety of angles. DSLs are going to be dealing with huge volumes as well as the serious nature of cases for a long while.

For someone working on this caseload volume, they need adequate resources at their disposal as well, not just around their case management, but also in terms of emotional support structures for themselves. A big part of Young’s work, she shares, is supporting the leadership team and DSLs by offering them a space for one-on-one support where they can come and offload, have an open conversation in confidence, and get their batteries recharged.

Provision of training, support and guidance along with the creation of policies that foster work-life balance, decent pay and conditions will also positively impact their wellbeing. 

Infrastructural Safeguarding to reduce the risk of coronavirus transmission

As schools reopen, it's important to think of ways to create safety in community settings. This includes infrastructural adjustments like CO2 monitors, creating seating arrangements that abide by social distancing norms, crowd-control measures, one-way systems, robust COVID testing, among other measures. 

Ventilation has been a cause of concern as we return to schools since the possibility of infection shoots up in poorly ventilated rooms.

The Department for Education (DfE) is spending £25m to provide 300,000 CO2 monitors (September 2021). These monitors will send out alerts if the CO2 levels rise and the fresh air is scanty. Former Education Secretary Gavin Williamson shared, “Providing all schools with CO2 monitors will help them make sure they have the right balance of measures in place, minimising any potential disruption to education and allowing them to focus on world-class lessons and catch up for the children who need it.”

Some schools are choosing to keep face coverings mandatory, others are also considering ozone disinfecting machines. If the school experiences an outbreak, bubble groups and face masks are advised to be enforced strictly.

Apart from this, many schools are encouraging children to take lateral flow tests at home and self-isolate if testing positive. Children in the age group 12-15 years are also being offered the COVID vaccines — a dose of Pfizer — to curb possible infections.

To successfully return to schools and in-person teaching, it’s important to minimise the risk factors and to highlight the available support for both children and staff. 

Safeguarding measures for pupil and staff wellbeing

As previously reported, teaching during the pandemic has been stressful. The challenges compounded especially for school leaders, like Headteachers who have been going above and beyond the call of duty to ensure smooth functioning of schools and teaching. The media has been teeming with stories of Headteachers’ wellbeing crises as they navigated the pandemic and the subsequent pivot to blended learning. All this while, they were attending to concerned parents, accelerating safeguarding efforts to combat online learning risks, and ensuring an equitable response within the new normal in education. 

Even prior to the pandemic, the pressures of educational leadership were demanding, points Peter Crockett, Volunteer at Headrest,

“These pressures included anticipation demands where school leaders were trying to foresee such things as the direction of policy, the future focus of inspection or future budgetary threats. There were also time demands in terms of managing workload, prioritising tasks and a plethora of unexpected events that necessitate reactive leadership. School leaders also had the situational demands of leading a complex organisation that required the effective delivery of educational provision, oversight of premises issues, budget management, staff recruitment/retention/well-being, and ensuring safeguarding duties are effectively met.” 

Their leadership skills, personnel management skills, change management, and often firefighting on social media were always on the test. 

Then came the pandemic, making headteachers’ jobs even tougher. Long work hours, hurdles in engaging students remotely, repeated pivots from the physical classroom to remote or hybrid instruction, increased cybersecurity concerns, management of bubbles, staff absence due to self-isolation, long-Covid, and more. All of this, in addition to the fear of loved ones contracting covid. This is why, as Crockett adds, it wasn’t unsurprising to find that school leaders were reaching a point of “physical and/or emotional overwhelm” and even, on occasions, “facing an abyss of self-doubt.” 

Gemma Scotcher, Head of Communications and Public Affairs for Education Support, shares, 

“Covid-19 has hit a profession already suffering growing levels of stress and pressure over recent years. Education Support's most recent research showed that half of all teachers have suffered at least one characteristic associated with work-related burnout ‘all the time’ since the start of this school year.”

Another report that provides a comprehensive insight into the mental health and wellbeing of all educational professionals throughout the UK, the annual Teacher Wellbeing Index, echoed similar concerns. Over half of all teachers (51%) and 59% of leaders said they had considered leaving the profession this year due to pressures on their health and wellbeing.

This wellbeing crisis is now being addressed through many resources, community-led initiatives, and other tools. Department for Education also announced an allocation of £800,000 on “tailored mental health and wellbeing support” to school leaders across England. The service will aim to deliver 

"a programme of professional supervision to a minimum of 2,000 school leaders who are experiencing mental health and wellbeing challenges. The service shall be delivered, as a minimum, through facilitated virtual or telephone-based peer support and one-to-one counselling." 

In the next section, we spotlight some other support resources available to school leaders. 

Co-founded in October 2020 by Ros McMullen and Andrew Morrish, two former headteachers and Multi-Academy Trust CEOs, Headrest offers a FREE daily wellbeing telephone support service for headteachers and school leaders. 

It works as a rapid response and professional advice and mentoring helpline for headteachers, by headteachers. There are a number of ways to contact them for free. You can call them and leave a message on 0800 862 0110. The team is available to talk every Monday - Thursday from 7pm - 8pm. During all other times, they arrange a time to call back at your convenience.

When the volunteers attend a call, their endeavour is to give colleagues the chance to articulate their concerns to someone outside of their school setting. Headrest, therefore, acts as a safe space for school leaders to address issues facing them. Empathetic and reflective listening is at the core of this service. 

What does this look like in practice? Crockett explains, 

“The issues are unique to the individual. Sometimes, we just offer reassurance that decisions or actions leaders have taken, or plan to initiate, make sense. On occasion, we need to reassure or change the focus so that one problem or error does not become an all-consuming issue. At times, we need to encourage colleagues to ‘look down the mountain’ and be kind to themselves about the progress they have made. Sometimes we need to signpost the colleague to other sources of support that are better placed to offer them the expert advice they need. Occasionally, we need to tease out the conversation and in doing so often find that the issue that triggered the call is not the main problem but the proverbial straw that broke the camel’s back.” 

The volunteer’s supportive responses are informed by their own time as headteachers. Even if the pandemic was unprecedented, the volunteers understand some of the emotional pressures and stressors of school leadership – including that lonely sense of accountability that can, at times such as these, feel exceptionally daunting. Often, headteachers sharing their concerns on the call find solace in shared experiences. From there, the call can move on to explore approaches to manage the issue at hand.  

The website hosts many free online resources for teachers, school leaders and other staff including top tips, videos, blogs and guides. They’ve also launched a new website offering free wellbeing resources for teachers and school staff in Wales: Taking Care of Teachers: mental health and wellbeing hub. Check out their Teachers’ Hub. ‘Taking Care of Teachers’ is the place to look for information, tools and guidance on school staff mental health and wellbeing in Wales. This resource by Education Support is made available completely free, with the support of the Welsh Government. 

Education Support also runs a free and confidential Helpline that allows anyone who is working in or who has worked in education, talk to a trained counsellor. If you’re struggling financially, whatever your role in education, they also have a  confidential grants service to help with emergencies. 

Additionally, they also have a school leaders’ wellbeing service, a dedicated space aimed at supporting and improving the mental health and wellbeing of senior staff. They offer limited free spaces for school leaders to take part in four sessions of peer support in a small group, led by a qualified facilitator. 

Education Support addresses the teacher wellbeing issue holistically. This is why they were able to identify the issues facing supply teachers. “Many supply teachers have suffered the termination of their contracts at very short notice, losing vital income. Many told us that their situations meant they were not entitled to apply for furlough. Long periods of limited numbers of pupils being on-site has also meant demand for supply teachers has been considerably lower over many months. The majority of those we have supported with emergency grants during this period have been supply teachers who have not needed financial assistance previously,” shares Scotcher.

Mental health issues and stressors don’t exist in a vacuum. Many school leaders are capable of designing solutions; they just need funding and systemic support to implement them. If school leaders feel that their involvement in education policy can help alleviate the issues facing them, the listening sessions can provide them with a space to voice their concerns and present their solutions.

For school leaders who want to be able to influence education policy, the Headteachers’ Roundtable provides a platform and space to impact change. 

In order to provide support to Headteachers in the form of resources and community, Founders Lucy & Jonathan set up HeadteacherChat.

They have created very useful School Leader Planners, and provide an incredible network of recommended edtech companies, to help narrow down the search for suppliers and relieve purchasing stressors. SCR Tracker is proud to be on this list as a preferred supplier for online single central record management, and we very much enjoy our continued collaboration with Lucy and Jonathan at HTCHat.

Headspace, the guided meditation app offers free access to all K-12 teachers, school administrators, and supporting staff in the US, UK, Canada, and Australia.

As a part of the free subscription, school staff can access guided meditations on themes ranging from stress and focus to the workplace. They can also access sleepcasts, sleep sounds, and sleep music to help create the conditions for a better night’s rest, and videos, quick workouts, group meditations, among other gentle wellbeing resources.

The Well Schools initiative aims to help improve education outcomes by placing wellbeing at its very heart to support school staff, senior leaders and young people. The Youth Sport Trust, a children’s charity, (along with Bupa Foundation) supports this movement that believes teacher wellbeing to be a prerequisite to great teaching. 

At a Well School, Staff and Headteacher wellbeing are actively supported and championed ensuring the whole school is well-led and connected with the wider school community. Effectively, by joining the movement, you become a part of a community that drives change, shares challenges and solutions and helps find support.

Technology to Optimise Workload Management

One of the stressors of a school leaders job is their responsibility for record management. Keeping the single central record up-to-date and compliant requires constant audits and checks on the headteachers’ part, often proving to be an arduous task. SCR Tracker removes that pain point by providing an immediate overview of school compliance, notifying users when their records aren't compliant – slashing workload and time spent on single central records, and increasing peace of mind. We also suggest using tools that make your life easier — whether it’s lesson planning, blended classroom management, or messaging apps.

A Little Guide for Teachers: Teacher Wellbeing and Self-care (A Little Guide for Teachers) by Adrian Bethune

Leaving Work at Work: A Practical Guide to Improving Work/life Balance for Educators by James Birchenough

‘Supporting Staff Wellbeing in Schools’ booklet by the Anna Freud National Centre for Children and Families. 

Twinkl and mental health charity Mind have partnered up to create a selection of resources, designed to support educators during times of school closures and partial re-openings.

Staff wellbeing underpins great education. If school leaders are constantly dealing with high levels of stress, it will have a negative impact on many aspects of a school’s functioning. Therefore, it is important that they have access to the right emotional and practical support and can in turn support children.

Prioritising Headteacher wellbeing: a spotlight on support resources

In light of recent events, attention has come to incidents of sexual abuse in schools. After scores of allegations received by Everyone’s Invited, pupils have shared with Ofsted Inspectors that such incidents of harassment and abuse are very common. Children have shared that they still feel unsafe in schools and that there’s a 'toxic rape culture' prevailing.

An alarming finding from the report concludes that such incidents have been normalised as a part of growing up, as pointed out by Amanda Spielman, Chief Inspector of Schools in England. The report itself mentions, “It is concerning that for some children, incidents are so commonplace that they see no point in reporting them.” Such gross normalisation of such incidents has prevented children, particularly girls, from reporting these incidents. Other reasons they may not report this could be shame, denial, minimisation, fear of consequences, low self-esteem, and more. Sometimes they feel unsafe reporting to the school, at other times, it’s been pointed out that action in the aftermath of reporting hasn't always been robust.

At the same time, the allegations have prompted a serious dialogue about creating a culture of psychological safety in schools. This means creating and cultivating an environment of safety where children feel empowered to report any incidents that jeopardise their wellbeing or safety.

This article will consider the idea of psychological safety in schools and how it can help create a conducive environment for victims of harassment and abuse. We also talk to child and educational psychologists whose inputs enrich the discussion on understanding children better & providing them with a safe space to grow, which is what schools are intended for.

Psychological safety exists when children can express themselves — all their ideas, questions, concerns and mistakes — without the fear of judgement, humiliation or punishment. In the school setting, this includes being able to ask any questions pertaining to studies but extends well beyond the academic. Research has demonstrated the importance of creating a psychologically safe environment in ensuring student well-being.

If we are to ensure a robust mechanism for concern reporting, it must go beyond structural provisions: we also need to create the right, psychologically safe environment where children can harmoniously develop as individuals, where they know they'll be understood, and not judged if they come forward with their experience(s). 

Understanding in the aftermath of an incident

In order to ensure psychologically safe environments, it's imperative to understand the emotions children go through when they experience abuse or bullying or any negative encounter for that matter. 

Angela Karanja, an adolescent psychologist and parenting teenagers expert whose work revolves around helping parents raise highly effective teenagers, shares how children process such incidents in the immediate aftermath, 

"Even if children don't understand what’s happening, they will still have a negative feeling towards such incidents, and in particular their bodies will. When something’s not aligned, our bodies know. But then the children might construe this as follows: this bad thing happened to them because they’re unworthy or wrong. They will tell themselves this narrative that something bad happened to them — and because the understanding is that bad things happen to bad people — so they must have done something to deserve this. These feelings of discomfort then morph into feelings of low self-esteem.”  

So while children might understand that something adverse has happened, they might blame themselves or feel like either something is wrong with them or that they did something to deserve this. Dr Oliver Sindall, Clinical Psychologist specialising in child and adolescent mental health, shares similar concerns regarding the negative emotional impact of bullying and similar incidents on young people, 

“The extent of that impact will often depend on the child’s development and whether they have experienced other forms of rejection from families and friends in the past, or other situations that have impacted their confidence and self-esteem. This means the impact can range from frustration and sadness to suffering severe social anxiety, low self-esteem, and depression. All of this can have a significant effect on a child’s academic achievement, which further increases feelings of inadequacy and low mood.”

It’s no surprise then that children are often reluctant to report incidents. The emotional impact of such can sometimes leave the children too shaken or traumatised and that can result in a freeze response. As corroborated by the Ofsted report, victims often feel that their experience will be trivialised and/or not taken seriously. Sindall shares,

“Not reporting incidents is usually based on the belief that nothing will change or that the bullying will get worse. For many children I have worked with, there is also the fear that they will not be believed or that their experience will be minimised by teaching staff. That fear of further rejection and being invalidated is often a real block to reporting incidents of bullying.”

How can we develop psychological safety for our children to thrive?

To properly safeguard pupils, it’s important to cultivate psychological safety in school spaces, whether virtual or physical. The question is: how?

First and foremost, the establishment of a psychologically safe environment in schools involves giving children a safe space for expression. Going back to the definition of psychological safety, children should feel comfortable expressing, sharing, and asking. Teachers and school authorities need to encourage self-expression as well as asking for help. Karanja shares instances where the “permissive” nature of the child-teacher relationship can stifle such expression. She shares, 

“When a kid does something wrong at school or even talks during class, the teacher immediately orders them to stop. When someone keeps hearing ‘no’ every time they’re trying to express, it impacts them — instead, teachers should give them a platform or outlet to speak. Ask them if they’d like to share what they’re talking about with the whole class or with the teacher separately after class.” 

“if we keep opening those channels of communication, what happens? Our young people begin to feel confident. They feel hard. They begin to feel seen. And they begin to feel listened to. And with that confidence, they know that this teacher is a safe person. The same goes for children’s toilet breaks. If they have to ask permission for performing a basic bodily function, it tells them they don’t have full bodily autonomy. So they should be allowed to inform — rather than request — for a toilet break.”

A culture of psychological safety means not just having uncomfortable conversations, but just any conversation at all. The aim is to normalise conversation because if we expect our children to share happening to or around them, we should first help them practice such self-expression and communication in routine conversations. 

How can we help students feel comfortable to report concerns?

Following from the above idea of normalising conversations, it’s safe to say that asking for permission can be uncomfortable especially when it comes to reporting concerns. The first step in making children comfortable with reporting concerns is relinquishing the power dynamics, Karanja suggests. 

“Most of the time, they don't even have the language to express themselves. So, as teachers and as adults, we have to abandon the idea of power. We should aim to be in a place where a student can tell their teacher and/or parents anything.”

Essentially, the immediate reaction to any report should be one of support, validation, and reassurance. One way to ensure that is by creating a validating response for all conversations, not just serious incidents. It is also recommended that a behavioural approach be implemented to reinforce a culture where sexual harassment, abuse, and bullying are not tolerated. 

Sindall also dives deeper into the psyche of children when they’re contemplating reporting an incident, “When young people are struggling with whether to report bullying their two main concerns are one, what will happen to the bully (and will this make it worse?) and two, whether teachers will believe and support them.” It’s imperative that all staff members are well trained in this kind of first-responder situations. The Ofsted report recommends that schools, colleges and multi-agency partners act as though sexual harassment and online sexual abuse are happening, even when there are no specific reports. Thus, all staff should be trained to understand the definitions of harassment and sexual violence, including abuse and bullying, to identify early signs of peer-on-peer abuse, and to consistently uphold standards in their responses to such incidents.

The bottom line, according to Sindall, is that “if a school can demonstrate that all young people who have experienced bullying or abuse will be listened to, supported emotionally and provided a robust safety plan, more children may begin to report incidents.”

When schools work to cultivate a culture of psychological safety, children will come forward not only in times of crisis when they seek help, but also flourish academically because they’ll feel comfortable asking questions. Children thrive in an environment where they are allowed to learn without judgements. If such incidents do occur, they will then feel comfortable taking it up with staff, who can then report the same to a superior or a Designated Safeguarding Lead (DSL). In cases where the child is deemed to be at severe risk, immediate action can also be taken. 

NSPCC, working with the Department of Education, has launched a bespoke helpline for children and young people who've experienced abuse at school, and for worried adults and professionals that need support and guidance. If you are concerned about something, you can contact the NSPCC helpline Report Abuse in Education on 0800 136 663 or email help@nspcc.org.uk.

Cultivating a culture of psychological safety in schools

Is your safeguarding response to the pandemic, the lockdown, and online teaching disability-inclusive? 

Child safeguarding means a set of policies, procedures and practices to ensure that the learning experience is safe for children and that the school proactively prevents doing harm. Keeping children safe in education is an ongoing exercise and the work doesn’t stop even in remote learning set-ups. On the contrary, the work of securing children’s welfare gets more challenging when our primary communication with them happens through screens. 

According to The Department for Education, safeguarding children and promoting their welfare includes protecting children from maltreatment, preventing impairment of children’s 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. A major part of safeguarding is said to be supporting vulnerable children and children with disabilities. 

In order to support them, first, it's important to understand who would identify with these categories. A child with disabilities is defined as someone who has ‘long-term physical, mental, intellectual or sensory impairments which, in interaction with various barriers, may hinder their full and effective participation in society on an equal basis with others.’ It has been widely discussed that remote learning can present unique challenges for children with disabilities. 

One, remote learning can feel alien — or alienating — for children with disabilities if accommodations are not made to help them feel included. (This may not be wilful — it’s understandable that schools often operate on limited resources themselves). Secondly, for many children with disabilities, schools aren’t just places of education. They’re also places where they receive additional support or therapy as a part of their learning program. Thirdly, going back to what we reported last year, children on the autism spectrum fundamentally thrive and survive on structure and routine, both of which have been severely disturbed. Neurodivergent children draw immense benefit from being around peers their age and get a chance to develop their proclivities. Online learning can barely be a one-size-fits-all even for neurotypical children; neurodivergent children can get robbed of developmental progress.

Therefore, it is important to think of our collective safeguarding response with a disability-inclusive perspective. 

What does an inclusive online classroom look like?

How can we begin the designing of a disability-inclusive safeguarding remote-learning response? Start from the source. Nothing will bring more accurate insights into your design than the lived experience of the very children you’re trying to include. Mahima Bhalla, a High School Learning Support Teacher who runs ValuEd, shares, “If you know the needs of your learners, you can accordingly design for them.” In every class, students with different needs should be identified and provided for. Even within people on the spectrum, each student will behave or react differently to different modes of learning. It is imperative to have an understanding of their individual needs. 

In order to be inclusive of people with disabilities, the remote learning experience needs to be designed with different abilities in mind. “This,” shares Nina Baliga, VP, Client Engagement and Equitable Strategies at interviewIA, “includes thinking beyond WCAG (Web Content Accessibility Guidelines) standards and thinking through how people are using technology today. Some examples of things you should think through include software accessibility for people who are blind or visually impaired, the Deaf community or Hard of Hearing, people with mobility impairments, and people who are neurodiverse.”

We’ve to incorporate more sophisticated technologies within the remote classroom, those that make it a safe space for children with disabilities. For example, apps like Tap Tap See, Seeing AI, Vision make use of artificial intelligence, device's camera and VoiceOver function to convert real-time footage or photos from a cell phone camera into words that are played through the phone’s speaker. This enables visually impaired people to “hear” their surroundings. There are a plethora of such assistive technologies to choose from, and the designs are increasingly becoming more inclusive with time. 

This is a good place to mention that that inclusion should be inherent in the very design of the curriculum & teaching modules. 

Think of accessibility as a standard, not an exception

Safeguarding children with disabilities should be understood as a fundamental aspect of setting classes, not as an optional add-on to be introduced “if there are children with disabilities in the classroom.” Operating on the assumption that all children are neurotypical is harmful because a lot of disabilities are invisible, get aggravated in uncomfortable environments, and many don’t get diagnosed until quite later in life. 

Bhalla offers a nuanced perspective she’s developed in her teaching, “If you know what hinders a students' learning, or physical or emotional/psychological safety, you will work to minimise those factors in the class. Examples could include, too many visual inputs on the screen (quite common during online learning), or the requirement of keeping videos on (could cause anxiety or distraction to some), or discussing topics that may be triggering for some (for instance death, or depression or sexual assault etc.). However, as a general practice, it is helpful to follow a few things routinely so that it benefits everyone, those whose needs may not be visible or known to you. For example, something as basic as giving breaks during the class. Especially in high school or college, where classes are longer, content-heavy and may not involve as much movement. Breaks are essential for neurodiverse learners and benefit all. Or, practising wait time, that is, after you have asked a question, you give everyone some time to think then respond.”

For many educational institutions, resource- or capacity-constraints are often cited as reasons they aren’t able to attend to the special needs of children with disabilities. These changes can be implemented without incurring massive expenses, and there are more strategies that can help deliver disability-inclusive child safeguarding for resource-pressed schools. 

Outside of lessons too, all designated safeguarding staff should make their work disability-inclusive. And if there are staff in charge of disability inclusion, they should work with the safeguarding staff to help improve child safeguarding practices. Such inter-departmental cohesion can help cover any erroneous omission. Ask your vendors & contractors to provide accessibility-first features in their products/services. There should be a culture where all tools, systems, and softwares used across the school have accessibility features by default. SCR Tracker, for example, is accessible across all devices and browsers, so the usage isn’t device-restricted. It also works with accessibility features such as VoiceOver, or screen readers.

Make content availability & lesson structures equitable

It’s a good start to contemplate what equity looks like in a classroom. First of all, any gatekeeping of the contents of the lesson, either on the basis of time, mode of access, or performance is inequitable. All reading material should be made available in a readable format, easily picked up by the most basic accessibility softwares. Content should also not be restricted to a particular kind of browser or device. Other forms of gatekeeping that can seem innocuous — like performance-based access to materials, or compulsory attendance for live lessons — should also be avoided. For example, teachers should make the lessons available both live as well as recorded, for children who may not follow — or feel overwhelmed by — the live versions. Secondly, it has been recommended that during remote learning, videos can be tools for equity and access for students with learning and thinking differences. Children often find it easier to understand instructions on the video. The video medium also helps provide accommodations in the form of subtitles & transcripts to support the main media, and can also help build personalised messages, which get lost in a more formal, written handout-style lesson.

Bhalla also suggests facilitating routines and protocols in class such that all students are included. Often, working together in groups can ease anxiety for many children and in order to make it even more effective, teachers can consider strategic grouping (that is, intentionally grouping certain students together) to create a supportive environment for those with disabilities.

Work collaboratively & make soft changes in lesson plans

As mentioned before, this exercise is an ongoing one. Therefore, changes need to be incorporated to accommodate the needs as & when they come to notice. Bhalla recommends keeping a loop of students’ feedback, “Ask them what helps them, what does not, what bothers them, what one could do to make the class more accessible and inclusive for them. How might the assignment requirements be different? For younger students, talk to their parents (since many are supporting their kids during remote learning).”

If you’re recording lessons for asynchronous viewing & wearing a mask when doing so, make sure it’s a transparent mask to help with lip-reading. Before uploading the lesson, double-check the transcripts for accuracy. Provide supporting material: a glossary for complex vocabulary, repeat complex concepts, and share instructions both verbally and in chat. When sharing a screen, keep minimal tabs on display (this is for children with attention sensitivity).

Beyond the classroom: Identify other risk factors

Schools do a lot more than teach. That shouldn’t change in a remote set-up. Engage with learners beyond formal teaching. According to the World Health Organization, stigma, discrimination, and lack of knowledge about disability, as well as a lack of social support for those who care for or support children with disabilities cna be risk factors. Children with disabilities are also more vulnerable to abuse and violence. On top of it, communication impairments also hamper the ability to disclose any abusive or traumatic exepriences. Regular, free-flowing one-on-one meetings with teachers can provide students additional support. 

Bhalla shares the importance of recreational elements, “Outside of the classroom, having a homeroom period or a social-emotional class, or some fun activities can be other ways to ensure that students with disabilities or those normally left out of the social circle too remain socially connected with their peers and adults at school.”

In order for the safeguarding plan to have optimum impact, the three key elements: a clear safeguarding ethos, a policy that sets out clear expectations and processes, and high-quality training, are required to function cohesively. This means that the incorporation of above points in the policy, their implementation in the lessons, and training of all stakeholders are all equally important. So, the staff responsible for informing, preventing, reporting and responding to safeguarding concerns should be made aware of disability-inclusive protocols and good practices. Similarly, very often, children with disabilities themselves should be made aware of their right to be safe from harm and redressal mechanism should be available in an accessible format.

Designing a disability-inclusive safeguarding plan for online learning