Why schools need to lead the way in child protection

Partnerships between services have ‘lost momentum’ on tackling child sexual exploitation, report finds
9th September 2016, 1:00am
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Why schools need to lead the way in child protection

https://www.tes.com/magazine/archived/why-schools-need-lead-way-child-protection

Schools have a vital role to play when it comes to tackling child sexual exploitation, the care watchdog has said, as a report said some partnerships between schools and other services had “lost momentum”.

Teachers can recognise and respond to the signs of abuse and schools can increase children’s knowledge about how to keep themselves safe, said Kevin Mitchell, the Care Inspectorate’s executive director of scrutiny and assurance.

He was speaking to TESS in the wake of the publication of a Care Inspectorate report that looks at how well council areas are protecting children.

The report praised one council for encouraging pupils to rifle through a mocked-up teen’s bedroom to teach pupils about how to stay safe online (see box, “Abby’s room”, below).

And another was praised for its “campus cops” who provided a link between pupils’ lives in the evening and weekends and school.

However, the report warned that some partnerships between different children’s services - including schools - had lost momentum when it came to tackling child sexual exploitation.

And in some areas, aspirations for disadvantaged children were not high enough, the document said.

Mr Mitchell said: “Schools have an important part to play in terms of recognising the risks and signs of child sexual exploitation and recognising and responding to information given by the children themselves, or the friends of children, who might be at risk or vulnerable.”

Mr Mitchell made his comments following the release of the report into the findings of a dozen joint inspections of children’s services carried out over the last two years by health, education and welfare bodies. The report also looked at local responses to child sexual exploitation.

Inspectors said that in two-thirds of the areas inspected, services were performing well in improving the wellbeing of children and young people, with performance rated as good or better. Four areas were rated as adequate and none were below adequate.

Despite this, inspectors found examples where children’s physical and emotional development had been compromised because they had remained in situations where their needs were not met well enough for too long.

The scale of child sexual exploitation in the UK has been revealed by high-profile abuse cases in areas such as Rotherham, Rochdale, Derby and Oxford.

Police Scotland has made it clear, however, that sexual exploitation takes place across all communities and it affects girls and boys.

Officers say that young people are exposed to exploitation in a wide variety of ways, from online grooming to face-to-face offending, and they may not recognise or understand what is happening until it is too late.

Since April 2015, the Care Inspectorate has been charged by the Scottish government with collecting information about how council areas are responding to prevent and reduce risks from child sexual exploitation.

The report says that most partnerships were including risks of sexual exploitation into the safety awareness provided in schools, building on existing Curriculum for Excellence programmes.

However, it also noted: “A few partnerships had lost momentum following an initial burst of activity.”

Stephanie Primrose, spokeswoman at councils’ representative body Cosla, said in response to the Care Inspectorate comments: “COSLA recognises the important responsibilities that we all have in relation to child sexual exploitation and the harm to the child or young person in such circumstances. This is a very complex issue and sometimes hidden and the work that all councils are doing needs to be recognised as well.”

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