Welcome back from hopefully a restful break. The Safeguarding in Education Team have been busy working over the holidays to bring you some resources which we hope will make your start to the term and academic year that bit easier.
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Contents
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September Resources
2025-26 Child Protection and Safeguarding Model Policy
This has been updated alongside our table of changes to accommodate the new version of Keeping Children Safe in Education (effective from September 2025). Please note: the 2025 version of KCSIE has not been finalised at the point of this bulletin being released, any reference to the document in both the training resources and model policy may be subject to change in line with the finalised version. You can access the model policy here
2025-26 Annual Training Refresher Slides
Please see linked safeguarding refresher slides for the academic year 2025-26. The modules reflect the local and national trends and offer time for reflection. Feel free to use it in its entirety or use it to supplement your own local procedures. Its recommended you download local versions to ensure animations and videos work effectively.
2025-26 Safeguarding Refresher Training with notes for you to use.
Due to staffing changes and the impact this has had on the team’s capacity we regret we are unable to provide you with a recorded video this year.
Please replace any old copies with this new version. - please click here to access the new poster. Changes: First Response webform no is longer in use. Safer Connections contact information.
Local Safeguarding Partnership Updates
Statutory returns - s.175 Audit 2024-2026 & Annual KSBP Education Annual Data Drop
Reminder, you have until the end of this academic year to complete your setting’s s.175 Audit and continue to work on your action plan. If you have not yet started your setting’s s.175 Audit, please contact your Education Safeguarding Advisor for support. The annual data drop is an ongoing piece of work, and we remind you to continue to complete via this link: KBSP Education Annual Data Drop
Please note, expectations from statutory guidance Working Together 2023 in line with paragraph 79 remain in place:
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‘Education providers, including multi-academy trusts, have a responsibility to play their full part in local safeguarding arrangements, including where their footprint extends across several local authority areas. This includes, but should not be limited to, responding to safeguarding audits of quality and compliance, as requested by the local authority and/or local safeguarding partners. This is to ensure that policies are consistent with the local multi-agency safeguarding arrangements and relevant legislation and/or regulations. They should also provide staff and governor training that meets local and national safeguarding requirements. Education providers where required should report their audits to their governing bodies and proprietors to be shared as requested by the LSPs. Training for designated safeguarding leads and designated teachers should include shared understanding about different levels of need and how these need to be responded to. Education providers also play a vital role in sharing and contributing to key information about children, including attendance data, exclusions, concerns about abuse, neglect, exploitation, and wider social and environmental factors including extra-familial contexts, which are a key aspect of keeping children safe.’ |
Child Protection Conferences
The Safeguarding in Education Team received high numbers of invites to attend initial and review Child Protection Conferences during the summer. We would like to thank the considerable number of settings that have been able to arrange cover and attend. For those settings that were unable to arrange cover, please can you raise with your safeguarding team and senior leaders.
RSHE Guidance
As many of you will have seen, the new RSHE guidance was released last month. While schools are expected to begin using the updated content from September 2025, the guidance will officially take effect on September 1, 2026. Schools are encouraged to implement changes ahead of the deadline where possible. The updated RSHE guidance positively emphasises the importance of ‘skilled delivery’ and the role of teachers in creating safe, inclusive learning – this was backed by an announcement of a training grant for schools, though details of the funding are still to be confirmed.
Here are a few reflections and statements from some of our national partners in PSHE:
Update Contacts – action required
Under the requirements laid out in Working Together to Safeguard Children and the duties and responsibilities for education settings in Keeping Children Safe in Education , we request any updates of safeguarding contacts for every education setting. This enables effective communication and information sharing between education settings and the local authority to promote the safety and welfare of children in Bristol.
Please do not forget where possible to provide an out of office number should there be a critical incident and/or child protection concerns. These will only be shared with explicit permission.
Does your setting have a generic safeguarding email address which is monitored by your safeguarding team? If so, please ensure this is shared when updating the contacts survey. If you do not currently have a dedicated safeguarding email address, please accept this as a request to create one which can be monitored in line with your safeguarding arrangements.
We are asking for this dedicated email in response to incidences when individuals have been absent and requests for information (eg, MASH) and invites to statutory meetings (e.g. Strategy discussions, CP Conferences) have been overlooked. The use of a dedicated safeguarding email is anticipated to support you in fulfilling your statutory duties in line with Working Together to Safeguard Children.
Community Safety Meetings and Forms – action required, if you have concerns to share
There are strategic, tactical, and operational multiagency meetings that take place to ensure community safety in Bristol. Meetings are multi-disciplinary and will hold different relevant members of the Bristol City Council Education service who will coordinate work and communication to the education workforce. To find out more about what meetings are happening, and their purpose please see our dedicated page - Community Safety Teams in Bristol for Education Providers (bristolsafeguardingineducation.org)
The Safeguarding in Education Team will continue to cascade and share information to and from these meetings with settings that are affected. With this in mind, we require you to share information so we can feedback to tactical meetings about what is going in your communities and ensure that the views of education are effectively represented.
School uniform descriptor survey - action required
Nationally there has been a recognised benefit in the ability of Police to be able to identify children linked to incidents by the school uniform they are wearing. Early identification enables effective and robust safeguarding measures to be taken in a timely manner. Progress for this national database is ongoing.
As part of Bristol’s contextual safeguarding approach and in collaboration with Avon and Somerset Police under Operation Bond, we are progressing this request at a local level. We are asking all Bristol education settings to fill in this survey with details of your setting’s uniform to assist with the potential identification of a child/ young person who may require a multi-agency safeguarding response. Please can this be actioned by 26th September: School Uniform Descriptor Survey
Strategic safeguarding survey – action required
Following anecdotal feedback from the workforce, we have identified a potential need for strategic safeguarding in education training for senior leaders. The aim of the training would be to promote an understanding of strategic safeguarding, promote effective leadership and challenge, and develop practical skills for managing safeguarding at scale in settings.
In order for us to validate this and to understand what will meet the need, we are asking you to complete the following survey. Please complete by 3rd October: Strategic safeguarding survey
KBSP Drug and Alcohol Strategy Survey – action required
Work is underway to develop a new Drug and Alcohol Strategy for Bristol. The intention is to ensure that it reflects the needs, experiences, and aspirations of our communities. This strategy will guide how we support people affected by substance use, promote recovery, and reduce harm. The best strategies are built in partnership with the voices of those who live, work and use our services. We are gathering information to inform the strategy and have developed a short survey which we would appreciate you completing Drug and Alcohol Strategy Engagement Survey- School Staff
Safer Connections Team
As part of Bristol City Council’s transformation of children’s services, the new Safer Connections team has been established to strengthen citywide responses to Harm Outside the Home, replacing the previous Safer Options approach.
Harm Outside the Home (HOtH) refers to abuse and exploitation experienced by children in settings beyond their family environment, such as peer groups, schools, public spaces, and online platforms. It encompasses a range of risks including child sexual and criminal exploitation, county lines, child-on-child abuse, online harm, modern slavery, and radicalisation.
The Safer Connections team is responsible for responding to HOtH through a contextual safeguarding approach, supporting both statutory and partnership services to target the social conditions that enable abuse, aiming to create safety within the environments children inhabit through prevention, disruption, support, and recovery.
Children’s Front Door Referrals - Reminder
All safeguarding referrals are now taken by phone at the Front Door by calling 0117 903 6444. Any questions, please send them to sonia.gingell@bristol.gov.uk
Safeguarding in Education Team updates
We say goodbye to Henry Chan and thank him for his outstanding leadership over the past six years in the Safeguarding in Education Team. Henry has stepped into his new role as the ALP Service Manager. We wish him every success in this exciting new chapter!
Jess Curtis has stepped up into the Team Manager role and Lis Clark into the Deputy Team Manager role both on an interim basis. We have just recruited a new East Central advisor who will start with our team in September, and we are interviewing for a fixed term contract for our North advisor. In the meantime, please continue to contact Jess Curtis (East/Central) and Elisabeth Clark (North) Helen Macdonald (South) until the new staff members are in place.
Prevent workshops available to all Bristol settings. For more information visit our dedicated webpage - Prevent Education Workforce Training
For details of the networks and to sign up to ones for the rest of the academic year please follow this link: Bristol Designated Safeguarding Lead Networks (bristolsafeguardingineducation.org)
New DSL and DSL Refresher training is now available to book. Please email tradingwithschools@bristol.gov.uk with any training specific queries.
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Dates/ times and links |
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Virtual New DSL |
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Virtual DSL Refresher |
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Face to Face Refresher DSL |
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Face to Face New DSL |
Dates of future courses can be accessed on our dedicated webpages.
If you can’t come to us and would like us to come to you – please consider commissioning us to do any bespoke CPD requests. Request Bespoke Safeguarding Training for your setting (bristolsafeguardingineducation.org)
We would love to continue to develop our community of practice. We have a limited budget, but if you can support us by hosting future training or network meetings, please can you let us know. If you think you can support us – can you kindly pass on this link to your business manager to complete https://www.smartsurvey.co.uk/s/Schoolvenues/