Safeguarding Information

Safeguarding all our children and families is of paramount importance to our school. We have a strong culture of safeguarding at Cuddington, and staff are trained to understand this is a responsibility for us all. You will find our Safeguarding policies on our policies page here.

Our Designated Safeguarding Lead is Beth Hacking (Executive Headteacher)

The Safeguarding Team comprises Sarah Potter (Deputy Headteacher), Margi Ireland (Family Support Worker) and Jenny Ducker (SENDCO).

All staff have training to respond to safeguarding concerns and there are systems in place for us to escalate concerns. Please contact the school and ask to speak with Margi Ireland or Beth Hacking (or a member of the safeguarding team) if you have concerns during term time.

If you have a safeguarding concern about a child whilst school is closed please call the Integrated Access and Referral Team (iART) or the Emergency Duty Team (EDT) for help and advice.

Telephone: i-ART - 0300 123 7047

The team can be contacted 8.30am to 5pm from Monday to Thursday and 8.30am – 4.30pm on Friday.

If you have an urgent concern outside these hours, or over a bank holiday, please call the Emergency Duty Team (out of hours) on 01244 977277.

Alternatively call Cheshire Police: 101 for non-emergencies or 999 in an emergency.

Domestic Abuse

If you or your children are experiencing domestic abuse and would like information and support, please see more information and contact details here. If you are at risk of immediate harm, call 999.

Operation Encompass

Our school is part of a project, which is run between Cheshire West and Chester schools and Cheshire Police. The project, called Operation Encompass, has been designed to provide early reporting of any domestic violence incidents that occur outside school, which might have an impact on a child in school. This is done through a phone call to school following an incident.

The project ensures that at least one member of the school staff, known as the Key Adult(s), is/are trained to liaise with the police and to use the information that has been shared, in confidence.

In this way, we aim to support each child who has been involved in, or witnessed, a domestic abuse incident. The Key Adults at Cuddington Primary School are Beth Hacking and Margi Ireland. If a call is received a Key Adult will make sure that a person the child trusts is available to help – if the child needs this. Most of the time this support is silent; keeping a careful eye on him or her and make sure the child has a calm school day. The confidential information is ordinarily not shared with all staff, just an agreement on how to help, if needed.

All schools have a duty to share any information with other organisations if they feel a child is at risk of being hurt. The Key Adult may contact other organisations. This is described in our Safeguarding policy.

The sharing of information from the Police allows the school to be ready to help your child straight away, and it means that parents are aware that the Key Adult knows that something has happened. Parents can come and talk to our Key Adult. The Key Adult can point you towards other people that can help. Our aim is to support children and their families.

A letter is sent to parents and carers with the information above via Parentmail each year.

Visitors to Cuddington

If you are a visitor to Cuddington (volunteer, student, other visitor) you will be given a quick guide to the school on arrival - there are additional copies available in the office, staffroom and staff bathrooms should you need to check them again. To keep all our visitors and children safe, please ensure you read this guide and ask for clarification if there is anything you are unsure about.

Staff use CPOMs as a way of recording incidents or concerns about our children, but if CPOMs is not available, or you are not a member of staff, we ask that you seek the Designated Safeguarding Lead as soon as possible. They will likely ask for your account in writing for our records.

Keeping Children Safe in Education

All staff working directly with children are expected to read at least part 1 of KCSIE, which is a statutory document issued by the DfE for all schools and colleges. You can find the latest guidance document below:

Prevent Duty

It is part of our statutory duty to ensure we align with the Prevent Duty.

The aim of Prevent is to stop people from becoming terrorists or supporting terrorism.

The objectives of Prevent are to:

tackle the ideological causes of terrorism
intervene early to support people susceptible to radicalisation
enable people who have already engaged in terrorism to disengage and rehabilitate

All staff are trained in what the Prevent Duty means, and what are the signs of causes for concern.

The school teaches Fundamental British Values through our SMSC approach.