SIMS for Safeguarding
Posted 2nd December 2016
With Ofsted placing greater emphasis on safeguarding than ever before, it is essential that staff in schools are aware of their responsibilities and have confidence in the monitoring systems that are in place.
School safeguarding defined
Safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children and young people is defined in the Government publication Working together to safeguard children as:- protecting children from maltreatment
- preventing impairment of children’s health or development
- ensuring that children are growing up in circumstances consistent with the provision of safe and effective care
- taking action to enable all children to have the best outcomes.
Key areas in SIMS
Schools and academies are required to clearly evidence the impact of their safeguarding responses for individual pupils and groups identified as 'at risk'. SIMS is designed to support schools in recording, monitoring and reporting for safeguarding and below we have outlined the key areas in the system for powerful and effective compliance:System Setup and Maintenance
The way in which you set up and maintain your school management information system (MIS) is essential; when you and your staff are confident with data entry and analysis it is much easier to evidence the impact of the policies and procedures in place to support your children and staff. When setting up your system and organising training it is important to consider safeguarding at the outset to ensure that school staff are briefed on best practice and data is populated correctly.
Pupil Attendance and Behaviour
Changes in pupil attendance and behaviour can quickly impact on progress. Configured correctly, the SIMS Homepage can provide an at-a-glance view of attendance, behaviour and progress for individual pupils and vulnerable groups. SIMS Activities can also enable you to check on the details of pupils expected to attend extra-curricular activities.
Discover
SIMS Discover will allow quick access to real time pupil data including bullying incidents, persistent absence and conduct (behaviour and achievement), enabling informed decision making and early intervention. The dynamic groups can be defined so that automated alerts appear on the SIMS Homepage when, for example, pupils fall in to or out of specific groups e.g. persistent absence.
Staff Records
Does your school use SIMS but maintain the Single Central Record (SCR) separately in Excel? SIMS can be configured to record all the required information for staff, governors and visitors. An up-to-date SCR can then be produced at any moment, via SIMS reporting.
How schools can learn more
Our SIMS for Safeguarding training and consultancy session helps to prepare schools to use SIMS for safeguarding, specifically the management of:- Single Central Record
- Bullying incidents
- Racist incidents
- Vulnerable children and User Defined and Dynamic Groups
