What Actions Should Schools Be Taking in Light of #EveryonesInvited
Investigating Complaints
Schools across the nation should be taking heed of the Everyone’s Invited campaign regardless of whether they have been named. If the movement has highlighted anything, it is that there is a widespread culture of abuse pervasive in UK education. Investigating complaints may seem obvious but there are some inherent complications in investigating some of these reports. The majority have been submitted anonymously and a large proportion are historical allegations.
While institutions might not be able to investigate specific instances, they need to be working towards building a culture where victims can feel safe to come forwards after experiencing abuses. A good start to this is by looking through any past allegations that may have been made. Were they investigated appropriately at the time? Was enough done to support those involved?
Reassessing and Implementing Policy Change
Looking at any historical complaints is also a good place to start when assessing whether the safeguards in an institution are up to scratch. This could involve separating your safeguarding policy and creating a peer-on-peer abuse policy. This kind of policy would provide a comprehensive framework on how to manage and report complaints.
Policies such as this need to be both easily understood and easily accessible. It helps to carry out consultation within the student body to ensure the policy itself functions in a way that benefits those that it intends to protect. Consulting in this manner means you can be confident that the student body are aware of the policy. Awareness of what to do in these situations could make all the difference to a victim.
Assessing the validity of your behaviour policy can also contribute to developing a healthier culture in institutions. Even if a behaviour policy is fit for purpose, promoting its existence and improving its visibility/accessibility can help raise awareness of proper standards of conduct.
Sexual Education and PHSE
Schools should also review the efficacy of Relationship and Sex Education (RSE) courses, as well as Personal Social Health and Economic education programmes. These programmes are intended to provide a framework to encourage young people to have healthy and respectful relationships. While these courses are inherently difficult to teach because of pupil attitudes but equally educator embarrassment.
It is important that these programmes have a particular focus on challenging attitudes that can grow into unhealthy behaviours. It is essential that they also focus on key issues such as consent, coercion, pornography and misogynistic behaviour.
Extra-Curricular Training
Many schools have started to introduce what is known as ‘Active Bystander’ Training. This kind of training teaches individuals who may witness inappropriate behaviour, how to call it out in the correct way. They teach methods on how to challenge this behaviour in ways that go beyond simple confrontation.
People can often be unaware of how damaging their behaviour is. If no one has ever challenged their way of thinking they can fall in the trap of thinking that the way they view the world is normal. Being an active bystander teaches you how to educate those around you to better protect the vulnerable. At its core that’s all safeguarding is; working your hardest to ensure the safety of those you care about and those you come in contact with every day.
If you or someone you know has been affected by some of the issues highlighted in this article, it’s important they know that there are resources out there to help. Below are some of the recommended resources for those who need them:
NSPCC Report Abuse in Education Helpline - Everyone’s Invited: 0800 136 663
Police UK - For non-emergency enquiries call: 101
Crimestoppers - Anonymous Helpline: 0800 555 111