Safeguarding and Child Protection
Safeguarding’ is defined in Keeping Children Safe in Education (2023) as;
- protecting children from maltreatment;
- preventing impairment of children’s mental health and physical 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.
‘Child Protection’ is the intervention that occurs when children have been significantly harmed or are at risk of significant harm.
‘Child’ refers to everyone under the age of 18.
‘Parent’ refers to birth parents and other adults in a parenting role for example adoptive parents, step parents and foster carers.
‘Staff’ or ‘members of staff’ refers to all teaching, non-teaching, support, supply, peripatetic, contract staff, governors, volunteers and trustees working in or on behalf of Grace Academy Coventry.
We recognise that safeguarding and child protection is an essential part of our duty of care to all students and all staff have a responsibility to provide a safe environment in which children can learn. We understand that safeguarding, child protection and promoting the welfare of all children is everyone’s responsibility and everyone has a role to play in protecting children. We recognise that our school is part of a wider safeguarding system for children and work closely with other agencies to promote the welfare of children. We maintain an attitude of ‘it could happen here’ and will consider the wishes of, and at all times, what is in the best interests of each child.
Grace Academy Coventry is committed to the following principles;
- All children have the right to be protected from harm.
- Children should feel safe and secure and cannot learn unless they do so.
- All staff are responsible for keeping children safe and have a responsibility to act if they think a child is at risk of harm.
- Working with other agencies is essential to promote safeguarding and protect children from harm.
- Early help and providing support to families and/or children as soon as a problem emerges is essential to improving outcomes for children and families.
Please visit the polices page for the Safeguarding policy and the annex.
The purpose of this policy is to;
- Promote safeguarding and child protection and to demonstrate Grace Academy Coventry’s commitment to keeping children safe;
- Provide all members of staff with the information required to meet their safeguarding duty and protect children from harm;
- Provide stakeholders with clear information relating to Grace Academy Coventry’s safeguarding and child protection procedures;
- Ensure that staff understand, can recognise and can respond to the indicators of abuse;
- Ensure that all staff are aware of their mandatory reporting duty in relation to Section 5B of the Female Genital Mutilation Act 2003; and
- Ensure that children are protected from maltreatment or harm.
If you have any questions or queries regarding any aspect of Safeguarding please do not hesitate to get in touch with our Designated Safeguarding Lead, Miss Rhiannon Spear on 02476 589 025.
Our school is required to identify a Prevent Single Point of Contact (SPOC) who will be the lead within the organisation for safeguarding in relation to protecting individuals from radicalisation and involvement in terrorism. The SPOC for Grace Academy Coventry is Miss Rhiannon Spear.
These links may also be useful outside school hours:
MASH Telephone number: 02476 788 555
MASH online referral form: http://www.coventry.gov.uk/safeguardingchildren
Out of hours Emergency Duty Team: 02476 832 222
Other recommended numbers:
Childline Tel: 0800 1111
Visit: https://www.childline.org.uk
If it is about a member of staff please contact the Coventry Safeguarding Children Partnership (LADO):
Email: lado@coventry.gov.uk
Tel: 024 7697 5483
Visit: https://www.coventry.gov.uk/cscpcontacts