Mindful of the rapidly evolving digital world and
the risks that exist in it for young people, Bilborough College wanted to
further develop their culture of safeguarding through National Online Safety.
Michelle Harvey, Designated Safeguarding Lead,
joined us to discuss how the college has benefited from gaining unlimited
access to our award-winning training and resources.
The
importance of online safety
For Bilborough, it was crucial
to make sure they were keeping up to date with developments in the online
world.
“Raising awareness of online
safety is massively important,” Michelle confirmed. “With the latest updates to
the DfE’s Keeping Children Safe in Education, it’s crucial to meet those
standards.”
She continued: “We're aiming to
engage with our parents, carers, governors and all staff to ensure that they’re
aware of the latest online risks and dangers.”
Joining
National Online Safety
“National Online Safety was
recommended to us at a conference,” Michelle recalled. “We couldn’t
deliver training face to face throughout the pandemic, so it was ideal for that
time.”
Protecting children online is a
collective responsibility - sitting not only with school staff but with parents
and carers too.
Michelle explained: “We send
the resources to our parents and carers when games, apps or devices are
highlighted as a concern.
“There’s always something
available that we can use to inform parents and carers. We share the resources
in our online safety newsletter too,” she added.
A key benefit for Bilborough College was our role-specific training,
with the ability to empower all members of the school community to keep
children safe online.
“We’ve used the training and
resources for everyone,” Michelle nodded.
"It
really does cover all roles and responsibilities.”
On achieving Certified School status, the staff at Bilborough College
felt that their commitment had paid off following a real team effort from the
whole community.
Michelle smiled: “We’ve said a huge thank you to everyone for engaging
with the training and resources, as it’s resulted in our Certified School
accreditation. It’s been marvellous for us; it’s definitely
ticking all the boxes.”
