Our trusted services for schools and colleges to help them to meet the requirements of Keeping Children Safe in Education
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Empowering Governors
More and more is expected of your governing body. From meeting the statutory requirements through high quality training, to delivering supportive reviews, we can help your governing body become truly effective.
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Safeguarding Training
Covering all your statutory training needs and championing the huge added value of collaborative training spaces, we deliver our unique safeguarding summits, 2 for 1 places on all our DSL courses, all staff training and training for governors.
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Audits and Evaluations
There’s nothing more helpful to understand the effectiveness of your safeguarding arrangements than to commission independent experts to assess how well your safeguarding work supports and protects your pupils.
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Policy Development
Policies should never be a tick-box exercise and must reflect the real life situation in which they operate. Whatever you need support or resource to develop, we make sure they are fit-for-purpose, compliant and workable.
Empowering Governors
Our consultants can tailor their work to the needs of your Governing Body, and bringing their combination of experience working in education and our knowledge of working in governance and with boards across sectors, you can be confident you will get what you need!
Here are three examples of how we can support you:
Improving your governing arrangements - especially in line with the 50+ statutory requirements of Keeping Children Safe in Education
Strategic Safeguarding Leadership training for Governors, to meet the requirements of Keeping Children Safe in Education
Independent and supportive reviews of the school or college’s compliance with the DfE’s expectations of use of technology, cybersecurity and online safety
Improving your Governance Arrangements
From supporting the Chair of Governors, through to developing terms of references and sub-committee structures our knowledge of governance can help to make your governing body more effective. We have worked with govening bodies to create risk registers, strategies and improvement plans.
As we're collaborating with our clients we are learning lessons all Boards can improve from and you can too! Just download our 7 questions you need to ask in your organisation guide (below) and give yourself a head start.
Strategic Safeguarding Training for Governors
Keeping Children Safe in Education says:
“Governing bodies and proprietors should ensure that all governors and trustees receive appropriate safeguarding and child protection (including online) training at induction. This training should equip them with the knowledge to provide strategic challenge to test and assure themselves that the safeguarding policies and procedures in place in schools and colleges are effective and support the delivery of a robust whole school approach to safeguarding.”
This isn't introduction to safeguarding training, but something more tailored to the needs of strategic leaders. That's why Keep Governance and Safeguarding is best placed to support you to ensure you Governors, Trustees or Proprietors are able to discharge their statutory responsibilities. We're working with some of the most inspirational and compassionate organisations who are focussed on continually improving their safeguarding practice, including with some of England's elite football clubs through our work with the Premier League.
Together, we're finding innovative ways to improve their safeguarding governance arrangements and ultimately help their leaders make their organisations safer. We work in partnership with organisations focussed on improving their safeguarding frameworks. We take a strategic perspective, ensuring your safeguarding work is effective and protects your people.
Independent and supportive compliance reviews
Keeping Children Safe in Education is clear that:
Online safety is as the core of strong safeguarding practice; and
Governing bodies are responsible for ensure safe use of technology in teaching and administration
KCSiE also points to a number of self assessment tools to review the effectiveness of your filtering and monitoring, your use of AI and your preparedness for potential cyber attacks. While these are helpful tools, binging in the external consultant from Keep Governance and Safeguaring, who understand the technological context can make the assessment impartial and more accurate for you and make key recommendations for the school.
Safeguarding training to meet your statutory responsibilities
If you're looking for safeguarding training, Keep Governance and Safeguarding 's experience in delivering to staff across sectors is second to none, and we are proud that the vast majority of participants on all our courses rate their training as Very Good or Excellent.
While our DSL training is competitively priced and always exceedingly well rated by learners, our Safeguarding Summits provide a greater level of value for schools and colleges committed to the continued improvement of your safeguarding practice and curriculum
"This training was fantastic because it was more relevant to my own setting than any other safeguarding training I have been on before. Holding our own safeguarding summit with the support of Andy, allowed all members of our safeguarding team and senior leaders to get together, receive training relevant to the latest KCSiE but most importantly with a focus on St James. There was opportunity for everyone to actively participate and hear all views from staff members on the practises and strategies used in school. The day was really worthwhile, valuable to all of our safeguarding team, very interesting, up to date and excellent value for money. The action plan produced was specific and detailed and has already had a significant impact."
Ben Caldicott, Headteacher and DSL at St. James CofE School, Hereford
Safeguarding in Education for Designated Safeguarding Leads, their deputies and Governors with Lead Responsibilities
The team of trainers we use to deliver your DSL training courses have all taught in UK schools and our training content has been developed with DSLs. We know what you need to know and how to make your investment in training worthwhile. That's why we always receive very positive feedback from our participants.
Keeping Children Safe in Education 2024 states “The [DSO] role carries a significant level of responsibility and the postholder should be given the additional time, funding, training, resources, and support needed to carry out the role effectively” [p103]” and “The designated safeguarding lead (and any deputies) should undergo training to provide them with the knowledge and skills required to carry out the role. This training should be updated at least every two years” [Annex C].
Because we believe in a collaborative approach to safeguarding, we encourage members of staff train together where they can write safeguarding development plans which provide value long after the event is complete. To this end, we offer two-for-one tickets on all our DSL training courses. We deliver these in-person courses across the West Midlands and you can book a place on them by clicking on the buttons below:
Safeguarding for all staff
The statutory expectations of all organisations working with children or vulnerable adults are that all staff should undergo safeguarding training appropriate to their role. Too often all staff training focuses on the signs and indicators - let's face it, that's the easy part - but our training is focused on developing the "think safeguarding" culture across your staff team, encouraging appropriate conversations to ensure nothing is missed or dismissed. Our all staff training content includes:
What safeguarding children is and the statutory role of all staff
What staff should do if they have concerns about a child, hypothesising and professional conversations
Whistleblowing and what staff should do if they have concerns about safeguarding systems or another adult in school
Types of safeguarding, safeguarding issues and the indicators of abuse
Evaluations and Audits into the effectiveness of your safeguarding arrangements
Bring an independent eye to the assessment of your practice. We'll shape an audit around your needs and speak to your stakeholders to get an accurate view of your organisation.
Building on experience supporting a range of statutory agencies, service providers and third sector organisations to assess their safeguarding processes and procedures, Keep Governance and Safeguarding provides one-to-one support services and impartial strategic analysis to ensure your organisation is best prepared to safeguard the children it works with.
One school we partnered with to provide such a service underwent an Ofsted inspection shortly after we had delivered an audit of their systems. Impressed by the school's leadership's commitment to safeguarding Ofsted noted that:
"Safeguarding is effective. Leaders commissioned an audit of their safeguarding culture because they want to keep vigilant and make sure all its actions are as secure as they can be. Governors are overseeing the implementation of this audit and have regular contact with the designated safeguarding officer and his team."
All organisations working with children or vulnerable adults have a role to play in safeguarding and have statutory expectations on them, either through Working Together to Safeguard Children, the Care Act 2014 or the specific expectations of the charities' regulators across the UK.
One of these expectations is that organisations have appropriate policies to support safeguarding practice. Often developed over time and sometimes being left to go out of date, these policies do not always reflect practice and work together coherently.
We can review your policies based upon your practice, and sector best practice, in order to develop your policy suite.
Policy Development ensuring your safeguarding work is clearly documented and coherent
Why work with us?
In recent years we have seen the start of company directors being found guilty for not protecting vulnerable people in their care at the same time as statutory guidance is putting new responsibilities on Boards. Whether you are a Governor in education, a Non-Executive Director of a company or a Charity Trustee, we are here to provide tailored support to you.
For whole Boards, we provide Safeguarding Governance and Leadership Training which covers key areas of organisational responsibility including:
The safeguarding landscape and organisational culture
Key roles and responsibilities and the prioritisation of safeguarding
Developing Board oversight to support effective safeguarding governance
For Board members with responsibility for safeguarding we are a trusted adviser, to walk with you through your safeguarding responsibilities and provide confidence that you are providing effective oversight of safeguarding. We provide this service to Board members at some of the Premier League's top Clubs, school governors and the Trustees of national charities and can provide it to you in your role.
With extensive experience providing support for safeguarding leaders, including Heads of Safeguarding and Board members with responsibility for safeguarding at some of the Premier League's top Clubs or the Trustees of National Charities, we are well placed to help your leaders effectively discharge their responsibilities while ensuring your operational arrangements are robust.