Safeguarding and Esafety

Safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children is defined in Working Together (2015) as:

• 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.

At Whitley Bay High School all staff have been trained to follow procedures and understand policies which have been outlined through the Keeping Children Safe in Education (2022) publication and local guidance issued from North Tyneside’s Safeguarding Children’s Board. This includes when to make recommendations for children who will benefit from Early Help. Additional to this, the following roles have been appointed within school:

CHILD PROTECTION AT WBHS

Designated Safeguarding Lead

Linda Buckle 

Lead Governor for Safeguarding and Child Protection

Lara Lillico

Deputy Designated Safeguarding Leads

• Andy Sherlaw
• Sarah Lackenby
• Steve Williams
• Abi Welch
• Helen Daglish
• Marni Thomas
• Richard Chambers
• James Mackenzie
• David Lee
• Ian Clark
• Matt Bland
• Sarah Fitzpatrick
• Ankita Lawson
• Deborah Britland
• Emma Crow

Where we have any concerns about a child’s welfare we will take all appropriate action to address those concerns by working in full partnership with other agencies as outlined by the local authority and Keeping Children Safe in Education (2022) publication.

Our Child Protection and E-Safety Policies are downloadable below:

Esafety

Our school is passionate about creating and maintaining a positive culture towards the esafety of our students and staff. This is a whole school approach and we devote a large amount of time educating all stakeholders of the school on these issues. As well as appropriate subject lessons, our extensive Personal Development curriculum covers a number of topics which range from how to keep yourself safe online, to the importance of data protection and privacy.

We are determined to support students and parents beyond the classroom by providing resources that will support parents to talk to their child about a range of online safety issues, set up home filtering in a child-friendly way and set up age-appropriate parental controls on digital devices so that students are protected online from any harm or misuse. 

We therefore encourage parents to read through our downloads below, including our Esafety Policy (particularly Appendix A - Student Acceptable Agreement which covers appropriate use in and out of school) and the 'Support for Parents and Carers to Keep Children Safe Online' Government webpage which contains many useful links. This can be accessed here: Support for Parents and Carers to Keep Children Safe Online

We have also included a very useful and helpful link to a website which contains many parental video guides which include how to set parental controls on devices and social media. They are available via the link below:

Parental Video Guides

Parents and students can also use the following websites for support with online abuse during the school holidays. This includes sites for reporting and support.

• https://reportharmfulcontent.com/ 
• https://www.childline.org.uk/info-advice/bullying-abuse-safety/online-mobile-safety/report-remove/ 
• https://www.ceop.police.uk/Safety-Centre/
• https://www.iwf.org.uk/report/

We are also delighted to include a monthly e-safety newsletter in conjunction with Knowsley City Learning Centre. This aims to help inform parents and students of current and up to date features of online safety. You can download these and other publications below.

If you suspect a child is at risk from harm or abuse, you can contact the following services:

The Front Door 0345 2000 109

Emergency Services 999

NSPCC Whistleblowing Advice Line 0800 028 0285

The multi-agency safeguarding hub (MASH) also has a new professional advice

helpline 01916435555