Safeguarding & Child Protection
As A School, We Are Strongly Committed To Safeguarding
Safeguarding is everyone’s responsibility: all staff, governors and volunteers play their full part in keeping our children safe and protecting them from abuse, neglect and other safeguarding concerns.
Haywards Farm School operates a child-centred approach: a clear understanding of the needs, wishes, views and voices of children.
All staff, Proprietors and volunteers have a clear understanding regarding abuse and neglect in all forms including how to identify, respond and report. This also includes knowledge of the process for allegations against professionals.
What is Safeguarding?
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
Taking action to enable all children to have the best outcomes
Here’s what safeguarding entails:
Protection from Maltreatment:
Safeguarding involves shielding children from any form of abuse, whether physical, emotional, or sexual.
Health and Development:
It also focuses on preventing anything that could impair a child’s health or hinder their development.
Safe and Effective Care:
Ensuring that children grow up in safe and supportive environments is essential. This includes providing effective care that promotes their well-being.
Collective Responsibility:
Safeguarding is everyone’s responsibility. Anyone who interacts with children and families plays a crucial role in promoting their welfare and protecting them from harm.
Who Should I Contact?
If you believe a young person is in immediate danger, please contact the police.
If you are concerned about the wellbeing or safety of a young person in our school, please contact the safeguarding team by emailing
Alex Walsh DSL / Out of hours DSL
Safeguarding Children – Information For Parents
At Haywards Farm School, therefore, we believe that it is of the utmost importance to have robust systems for protecting children and safeguarding their welfare, throughout all the activities that the school undertakes. All our pupils have a right to be safe and to be treated with respect and dignity, and we work effectively with outside agencies to ensure that this is the case.
Safeguarding in school is a very wide area, covering all aspects of keeping children safe at all times. It includes the physical environment of the school buildings and land, a wide range of practices and procedures, and close liaison with various other agencies.
As part of our Safeguarding role, we teach all children how to keep themselves and others safe (at an age-appropriate level). Our PSHE Scheme of Work includes work on Domestic Violence, Drug and Alcohol Abuse, Bullying, Personal Safety, Inappropriate touching, Secrets, Relationships, Cyber Bullying, Internet security, etc. Children are also given clear information about how to report anything they feel uncomfortable about.
We are committed to monitoring and listening to all our pupils, in order to identify possible problems. Where there are serious concerns about a child’s safety, we will share our concerns with the relevant authorities.
We work closely with other agencies such as the Police, Social Care and the Health Service to ensure that children in danger are identified and kept safe.
From time to time, families may find themselves in difficulties which could prove detrimental to their children. We will also work closely with those families so that they are supported to ensure their children’s safety and well-being, and signpost them to other agencies that may be able to offer help and support.
If you have any concerns that a child is in danger, you should report it to the Social Care Emergency Duty team Tel: or the Police.
It Is Important For Parents To Be Aware That:
Staff and volunteers in the school have a duty to report concerns about a child, whether this involves the child being in need of additional support or help of some kind, or whether it is believed that a child may have been abused or is at risk of abuse.
There Are Four Categories of Abuse
Physical
Sexual
emotional
Neglect
In some cases, the school is obliged to refer children to children’s social care staff, either for the children to be assessed for their needs, or if an investigation into possible child abuse is required. In many cases, there will already have been discussions between school staff and the parents of the child, so the situation and concerns are not a surprise to the parents.
However, parents may not be told that the school has referred their child to children’s social care if it is thought that this might put the child at risk.
If school staff need to express concerns about a child or refer a child to children’s social care, it is appreciated that this can cause distress or anger for the child’s parents/carers. It is important however, that all parties – parents and school staff – try to discuss these matters as reasonably as possible so that the best interests of the child can be secured.
Children’s social care also tries to carry out its enquiries sensitively. It has to gather information with parents about the steps being taken and it is therefore beneficial that discussions are as open and as constructive as possible.
Haywards Farm School Safeguarding Policies
The governance board keep these policies under regular review. They ensure the Headteacher provides temporary updates on safeguarding as part of her report to the governance board. All policies are available on our policies page; please click the link below to view them:
Safeguarding Information for Pupils
S175 Safeguarding Audit
The S175 is a comprehensive safeguarding audit, which is carried out under Section 175 of the Education Act 2002, along with DfE Guidance on Safeguarding Children, Safer Recruitment and Keeping Children Safe in Education.
The S175 helps the school’s governance board/ proprietors to carry out an annual review of our safeguarding practices in order to monitor how the duties set out in the guidance have been discharged.
