About Us
Safeguarding
Child Protection and Safeguarding Children are at the heart of all we do at Dorset House. Please follow the link to our policy.
The safety and well-being of all our pupils is our highest priority; we fully recognise our moral and statutory responsibilities for child protection and are committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children at Dorset House. In particular:
- protecting children from maltreatment;
- preventing impairment of children’s health or development;
- ensuring that children are growing up in circumstances consistent with the provision of safe and effective care
- taking action to enable all children to have the best outcomes.
If a child is suffering, or is likely to do so, we must take action to protect the child. If a child is in need of additional support, and even if a child is not suffering harm / not at immediate risk, we must take action to promote the welfare of such a child.
Safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children is everyone’s responsibility. Everyone who comes into contact with children and their families and carers has a role to play in safeguarding children. In order to fulfil this responsibility effectively, all professionals should work together and make sure their approach is child-centred. This means that they should consider, at all times, what is in the best interests of the child.
We recognise that our staff are particularly important as they are in a position to identify concerns early and provide help for children to prevent concerns from escalating.
The school is responsible for:
- Ensuring that we have in place policies and procedures for dealing with concerns about a child and working with social care, the police, health services and other services to promote the welfare of children and to protect them from harm;
- Ensuring that our staff are familiar with the contents of this policy and with Part I of “Keeping Children Safe in Education” (DfE September 2016);
- Appointing key child protection staff – in particular, a Designated Safeguarding Lead with the status and authority to take responsibility for child protection matters. The Designated Safeguarding Lead will provide support to staff members to enable them to carry out their safeguarding duties and will liaise closely with other services such as children’s social care;
- Ensuring that our staff safeguard children’s wellbeing and provide a safe environment in which children can learn;
- Ensuring that our staff understand that they have a responsibility to identify children who may be in need of extra help or who are suffering, or are likely to suffer, significant harm and that our staff further recognise that they then have a responsibility to take appropriate action (to include working with and supporting other services, as necessary);
- Providing our staff with sufficient guidance about their behaviours and actions to ensure that they do not place our pupils or themselves at risk of harm or of allegations of harm;
- Ensuring that we have in place arrangements for dealing with allegations against members of staff, volunteers and the Headmaster, as set out in this policy and with regard to the school’s policy on `whistleblowing’ (as set out on in this policy and in the Staff Handbook);
- Arranging training for the Designated Safeguarding Lead, staff and volunteers;
- Operating safer recruitment procedures;
- Considering how children may be taught about safeguarding as part of providing a broad and balanced curriculum, to include e-safety;
- Complying with the statutory Prevent guidance. In particular:
- Assessing the risks of children being drawn into terrorism
- Working together with West Sussex Safeguarding Children Board
- Arranging Prevent training for teachers
- Ensuring that children are safe from terrorist and extremist material when accessing the internet at school