Safeguarding

Safeguarding is a central function of any school and our ‘culture of vigilance’ is embedded to ensure that we protect children, families and staff linked to our school community. Safeguarding is not simply ‘Child Protection’, it involves the safe employment of staff, the education of staff to keep children and themselves safe, raising the awareness of how children can keep themselves safe and ensuring that they know where to go and what to do should they need help. The partnerships between school and families and other agencies in protecting our community are important and for this reason, we have clear reporting arrangements and honest rapports amongst stakeholders.

We recognise that keeping our community safe involves raising awareness to the risks outside of school – online safety, pedestrian training and PREVENT to name a few.

Safeguarding is everyone’s responsibility and as lovely as our school is, ‘it could happen here.’ If you have concerns about a child’s safety or wellbeing, you can email Mrs Mitchinson – our Designated Safeguarding Officer v.mitchinson@pop.hslt.academy or contact her by calling school. Concerns are treated with the utmost sensitivity and using the information, we can establish any risks that may place a child or family in danger.

Outside of school – where there are significant immediate concerns about the safety of a child, you should contact the police on 999. 

If you believe the situation is urgent but does not require the police, please call 01904 551900 to contact the MASH to discuss your concerns.

Useful Links

Keeping Children Safe in Education 2023
Government expectations and guidance for schools

Safer Children York – Guidance

Safety Videos

Road Safety

Please take a look at the following videos on Road Safety:

Safety on the Railway

One attraction for families, is the railway link to our village and the City of York. The railway crosses two roads in different areas of Poppleton – one is on Station Road where the train station is (Public Highway Manually Controlled Gates) and the other on Millfield Lane, (Public Highway Automatic Half Barriers) where pupils cross each day to attend the local secondary school, Manor CE Academy.

For this reason, having a clear knowledge of the dangers of railways and how to stay safe is very important. Children learn about crossing the railway safely in school

This film highlights some of the key dangers around the railway and looks at what you can do to stay safe:

Safety near Rivers and Canals

Our school name reflects the geographical proximity of our learning community to the River Ouse. The river flows around the edge of Poppleton and is a wonderful feature of our village and York.

Although the River Ouse looks calm and welcoming, it is a fast flowing river, with a tendency to flood in wet seasons. Because of this, it is important that our pupils learn about the dangers of rivers, canals and other bodies of water and that they learn to swim to promote their safety.

A guide to Online Safety

At School

Children are learning more and more about the internet at a young age. It is important that children are educated from an early age on how to safeguard themselves online. This doesn’t just mean presenting them with information every now and then, it means embedding it into lessons across the curriculum, and facilitating discussion about it where possible. This is exactly what we do as part of our scheme of work. Children will learn about the 8 areas outlined in ‘Education for a connected world’: 
 
● Self-image and identity 
● Online relationships 
● Managing online information 
● Health,well-being and lifestyle 
● Online Reputation 
● Privacy and security 
● Online bullying 
● Copyright and ownership 
 
We follow the National Online Safety scheme, which offers comprehensive coverage of all 8 areas of online safety. Alongside this, we offer free access to online safety courses for all parents, so they can work alongside school to support their children’s online safety – regular links are sent out on school newsletters to remind parents. 
 
Aims of Online safety in school: 
Our aims are to ensure that all pupils, including those with special educational needs: 
 
● will use the internet and other digital technologies to support, extend and enhance their learning, in a safe and informed way; 
● will understand how to stay safe online; 
● will develop a healthy relationship with technology and understand how to look after their own wellbeing within the use of technology in school and at home.

At Home

As a parent, you will know how important the internet is to children – they use it to learn, play and socialise. The technology that children use every day can seem a bit daunting and you might worry about the risks your child can face online – such as bullying, contact from strangers or the possibility of them seeing illegal or inappropriate content. If at any point you are concerned about your child online, please do not hesitate to ask the school for support. In addition to this, please see below for a list of useful resources that may help you protect your child when they are online:

What can I do to help protect my child?

  • Rule setting/agreement – what, who, how long, where
  • Open discussion
  • Monitoring
  • Parental controls