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Safeguarding and support for pupils

 
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NAHT members are at the forefront of safeguarding children. School leaders are committed to keeping children safe, so they can learn well. NAHT believes that all pupils should receive the support they need to maintain their well-being and achieve their potential, both within school and from wider services including health and social care.

NAHT is campaigning to:

Enable schools to play their part in supporting pupils' well-being

  • Lobby for pupils and schools to get the support they need from wider services including health, social care, police and youth services
  • Influence the implementation of the proposals from the mental health green paper, including the senior lead for mental health and mental health support teams
  • Support schools to access relevant, high-quality training and resources to enable pupils to exercise their right to support for their mental well-being.

 

Support schools to safeguard and protect pupils

  • Engage with the DfE over proposed changes to the role of the Designated Safeguarding Lead
  • Influence changes to Keeping Children Safe In Education, Working Together and Sexual Violence and harassment guidance
  • Campaign to improve online safety for children and young people
  • Press the government to ensure home educated children are adequately safeguarded
  • Promote guidance and resources to support schools to protect children at risk of harm including involvement with violence and other crime.

 

Enable schools to support vulnerable groups of pupils

  • Campaign to ensure pupils with SEND can receive the support they need from schools and wider services
  • Press for improved alternative provision and collaborative approaches across communities to support pupils excluded from school
  • Provide information to schools to help them to support disadvantaged children
  • Enable schools to make informed decisions regarding parental requests to home educate
  • Ensure reforms to behaviour guidance and networks is evidence-based and appropriate for all schools and a diverse pupil population. 
 

Operation Encompass wins World Class Policing Award for its support of pupils exposed to domestic abuse

It has been quite a year for Operation Encompass. The scheme, supported by NAHT, sees police and schools working together to support children experiencing domestic abuse. 

In less than 12 months the charity has received a royal visit, the creators have both received OBEs, and to top it off Operation Encompass has been named overall winner in the inaugural World Class Policing Awards. 

Award nominations came from across the world, with finalists from countries including Dubai, New Zealand and Australia. Against strong competition, Operation Encompass was the clear winner of the overall award, with the international judging panel commenting how impressed but also deeply moved they were by what has been achieved through the scheme.

They said: "This deals with a perennial issue that happens behind closed doors, affects generations and has a pernicious effect on society. As a charity, police and education collaboration, it's exceptional, and, most importantly, it has been sustained. It has now had almost complete UK saturation and has spread to other countries."

Co-creator of Operation Encompass, head teacher Elisabeth Carney-Haworth OBE, commented: "This award is a true endorsement of the power of simplicity and partnership-working to support some of the most vulnerable in our society. It will hopefully assist us in spreading Operation Encompass even further afield. Wherever there is domestic abuse, wherever there are children, then there should be Operation Encompass: in every force, in every school, for every child."

Find out more about Operation Encompass in schools.

First published 25 November 2019

First published 25 November 2019
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