St. John’s C of E Primary School is fully committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children in our care and to  have effective safeguarding procedures in place to support families, children and staff at our school.  It is our aim that children and adults always have someone they are able to talk to if they have any worries or concerns.  Our core safeguarding principles are:

• Prevention: positive, supportive, safe culture, curriculum and pastoral opportunities for children, safer recruitment procedures.
• Protection: following the agreed procedures, ensuring all staff are trained and supported to recognise and respond appropriately and sensitively to safeguarding concerns.
• Support: for all pupils, parents and staff, and where appropriate specific interventions are required for those who may be at risk of harm.
• Collaborating with parents and other agencies: to ensure timely, appropriate communications and actions are undertaken when safeguarding concerns arise.

Our Child Protection policy can be read here and our child friendly version here.  The policy is reviewed regularly and updated in line with changes to the Department of Education document, Keeping Children Safe in Education.

The policy is one of a series in the school integrated safeguarding portfolio and should be read in conjunction with the policies as listed below and can be found on our policies page:

• Behaviour
• Mobile and smart technology and Social media
• Anti-bullying
• GDPR and information sharing
• Image use
• Relationship, Sex and Health Education (RSHE)
• Health and safety, including plans for school reopening
• Attendance
• Risk assessments, such as school trips, use of technology, school re-opening
• First aid and accidents
• Managing allegations against staff
• Staff code of conduct
• Acceptable Use of Technology Policies (AUP)
• Whistleblowing

Our School Designated Safeguarding Leads are Mr Niall Dosad – Headteacher, Mr Tom Angus – Deputy Headteacher, Miss Jenny Stiff – Deputy Headteacher, Mr Dan Selby - Deputy Headteacher and Mr Jack Hyett - Assistant Headteacher.

Safeguarding Training Attended                         

DSL training

Female Genital Mutilation Recognising & Prevention v1.3

Prevent e-learning

Online Safety (E safety for DSL)

Safer Recruitment

If you have any concerns about the well-being or safety of any of our pupils, or you are a St. John’s parent and require support yourself, please contact one of the designated Safeguarding Leads using the email address:

safeguarding@st-johns.kent.sch.uk  

Other people who can help with worries are:

For adults: Mrs Audra Maskell – Attendance Officer         a.maskell@st-johns.kent.sch.uk

For children: Miss Becca Owens – School Counsellor          b.owens@st-johns.kent.sch.uk

If you are concerned about a child in Kent, please call Kent Safeguarding Children Multi-Agency Partnership on 03000 411111 (Out of hours 03000 419191).  You can find out more about the partnership on their website:

Home - Kent Safeguarding Children Multi-Agency Partnership (kscmp.org.uk)

Other helpful websites:

Info and advice | Childline

Protecting children - Kent County Council

Online Safety 

At St. John’s we believe that online safety is an essential part of safeguarding, please click here for further information.