Safeguarding and Welfare Officer

Bourton Meadow Academy, Buckingham, Buckinghamshire, MK18 7HX

Deadline is today

Start date details
ASAP
Closing date
23 February 2025 at 11:59pm
Date listed
9 February 2025

Job details

Job role: Pastoral, health and welfare
Visa sponsorship: Visas cannot be sponsored
Working pattern: Full time
Contract type: Permanent
Full-time equivalent salary: £32,918.00 Annually (FTE) Full time plus INSET days plus three weeks - to cover occassional work during the school holidays (42 weeks in total)

Safeguarding and Welfare Officer job summary

Duties and responsibilities

Create an Effective Safeguarding Culture

Support the Senior Leadership Team to:

ensure the school is carrying out its statutory responsibility (Education Act 2002) and Keeping Children Safe in Education (KCSIE) for safeguarding and promoting the wellbeing of pupils.

work with all staff to promote key policies relating to safeguarding (e.g. child protection, behaviour and bullying, online safety, code of conduct) and ensure that these policies and procedures are understood and being followed effectively.

provide regular mandatory and responsive training and updates to staff in relation to safeguarding, including contextual safeguarding in Buckingham and its surrounding locality.

highlight the importance of online safety and ensure appropriate coverage within the curriculum, assemblies, workshops and through the sharing of information with the wider community.

foster effective relationships with staff, parents/carers and external agencies, recognising the importance of honest, transparent conversations, ensuring that the child’s best interests remain a primary consideration when making decisions.

actively challenge discrimination and establish and maintain a positive regard towards pupils, students and staff, promoting equality, diversity and inclusion (EDI).

Managing Referrals

Respond appropriately to safeguarding disclosures and concerns which relate to the safety, welfare and wellbeing of students in a timely manner and in line with school policies:

o Refer cases of suspected abuse and neglect to the local authority children’s social care.

o Refer cases where there is a radicalisation concern.

o Refer cases to the police where a crime may have been committed.

o In collaboration with senior leaders, make referrals to other outside agencies, organisations and professionals to help a child to thrive

Act as the first point of contact for external agencies and organisations that contact the school with a query or concern about the safety or welfare of a child.

Liaise with teachers and respond promptly to requests for information.

Attend and contribute effectively to network meetings, strategy meetings, child protection conferences and core group meetings, and rigorously follow up any action points from these meetings.

Keep detailed, accurate and secure written records of concern and referrals. These aeviewed regularly to ensure concerns are escalated as appropriate and any multi-agency involvement are held to account for escalating concerns.
Meet with the Deputy DSLs to regularly review cases and share best practice and expertise. Support the regular analysis of all cases to identify possible trends.
Working with pupils

Form respectful, trusting relationships with all pupils and be a visible and approachable contact within school

Identify strategies to overcome individual pupils' barriers to learning

Provide wellbeing interventions, advice and guidance for pupils experiencing wellbeing, welfare or safeguarding issues

Promote high standards of behaviour and consistently implement the school's behaviour policy.

Support the transition of new pupils or existing pupils returning to school, putting the necessary support in place to overcome any barriers to learning.

Working with staff

Promote a strong safeguarding culture within the school and ensure each member of staff has access to, and understands, the school's child protection policy and other policies relating to safeguarding.

Support the induction of new staff and ongoing training needs of exisiting staff by delivering safeguarding induction and supporting the Operations Manager to ensure that mandatory training is up-to-date and an accurate training log is maintained.

Act as the first point of contact for staff who have a safeguarding concern about a pupil.

Support and advise staff and help them feel confident on welfare, safeguarding and child protection matters

Help promote educational outcomes by sharing information with teachers and school leadership staff about the welfare, safeguarding and child protection issues that children are experiencing or have experienced, identifying the impact that these issues might be having on children’s attendance, engagement and achievement at school.

Encourage a culture of listening to children and taking account of their wishes and feelings, amoung all staff, and in any measures the school may put in place to protect them.

Understand the difficulties that children may have in approaching staff about their circumstances and consider how to build trusted relationships which facilitate communiccation.

Work alongside the Attendance Officer to monitor and implement strategies to improve the attendance of pupils, especially those pupils who are persistently absent or at risk of falling into this category.

Work with senior leaders to develop whole-school pastoral care policies and plans.

Work with senior leaders and other relevant colleagues to promote online safety, identifying and responding to concerns and potential risks.

Support staff during the referral process.

Working with parents/carers and external agencies

Act as the lead point of contact for parents/carers in relation to pastoral and safeguarding issues, involving relevant staff members as necessary.

Promote supportive engagement with parents/carers in safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children, including where families may be facing challenging circumstances.

Maintain honest and transparent communication with parents when discussing children's safety, wellbeing, progress, behaviour and attendance and the action the school is taking to support their child(ren).
Build and refresh knowledge on the range of external support available that could support pupils’ individual needs and liaise with these, as required.

Signpost parents/carers to outside agencies who can provide additional advice and support for the family.

Ensure the child protection policy is available publicly and parents and carers are aware that referrals about suspected abuse or neglect may be made and the role of the school in this.

Administration and record keeping

Complete relevant paperwork required by external agencies
Manage the child protection file:

o Ensure child protection files are kept up to date

o Keep information confidential and store it securely, only sharing information with those that need to have it, in line with information sharing advice, set out in Keeping Children Safe in Education (KCSIE).

Make records include:

o A clear and comprehensive summary of the concern

o Details of how the concern was followed up and resolved

o A note of any action taken (or action not taken and the reasons for this), decisions reached and the outcome

Where children leave the school (including in-year transfers):

o work with the Operations Manager to ensure safeguarding records are securely transferred to the new school as soon as possible, separately from the main pupil file, with a receipt of confirmation, and within the specified time set out in KCSIE/

o consider whether it would be appropriate to share any additional information with the new school before the child leaves, to help it put appropriate support in place

Understand the school's online safety policy and the school's filtering and monitoring systems and work with senior leaders to identify and block the use of inappropriate sites.
Understand the need for information sharing, booth within the school, with other schools on transfer and with safeguarding partners, other agencies, organisations and practitioners.
Understand and work within relevant data protection legislation and regulations when recording, sharing and storing information (data).

Training

Undergo training to gain the knowledge and skills required to carry out the role and meet the expectations set out in KCSIE. This will include mandatory training such as DSL training and refreshers, Prevent, FGM, Sexual Harassment, as well as other training that will support the welfare and wellbeing of pupils.

Keep up-to-date with safeguarding issues on both a national and local scale and any changes to legislation.

Please note that this is illustrative of the general nature and level of responsibility of the role. It is not a comprehensive list of all tasks that the Safeguarding and Welfare Officer will carry out. The postholder may be required to do other duties appropriate to the level of the role.

Working Hours

The Safeguarding and Welfare Officer is required to safeguard and promote the welfare of children, and follow school policies and the staff code of conduct. During term time, they should always be available during school hours for staff in the school, to discuss any safeguarding concerns. Ideally, this will be in person, but can also be via phone or video call in exceptional circumstances.

On occasion, flexibility with working hours may be required to enable the Safeguarding and Welfare Officer to make and manage a referral for a child who is in immediate danger, liaising with the local authority children’s social care and/or the police in order to protect the child.

This role is a full-time role for 42 weeks (term-time plus INSET days plus three weeks). This is to enable the Safeguarding and Welfare Officer to undertake occasional work during the school holidays. This may include training for the role, preparation for staff CPD, responding to or making a referral, responding to a request for information from safeguarding partners or attending meetings (either in-person or remotely) including network meetings, core group meetings, strategy meetings and child protection conferences. The deputy DSLs will also be on hand to support, where required

Commitment to safeguarding

Our organisation is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children, young people and vulnerable adults. We expect all staff, volunteers and trustees to share this commitment.

Our recruitment process follows the keeping children safe in education guidance.

Offers of employment may be subject to the following checks (where relevant):
childcare disqualification
Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS)
medical
online and social media
prohibition from teaching
right to work
satisfactory references
suitability to work with children

You must tell us about any unspent conviction, cautions, reprimands or warnings under the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975.