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Keeping Your Child Safe – Key Document

Our Pastoral Team and Support

Our pastoral team at Burnley High School are second to none in the help, advice, guidance and support they provide for our learners. It is vital that our Pastoral team work in cohesion with our learners, teachers, parents/careers and external agencies to ensure the safety and wellbeing of our learners.

Our aim is to identify and if possible, pre-empt any concerns or issues as early as possible, thus removing any barriers to learning which may be preventing our learners from reaching their full potential. We know our learners well, know what makes them ‘tick’ and this rapport helps us to work closely with them to identify any external factors which may prevent them from being their best. We then work closely alongside the teaching and support staff to develop positive relationships with them and their families in order to offer as much support and intervention as possible.

We respond as quickly as possible to any issues and ensure that difficulties are discussed and resolved in the best possible way. We offer help and support in the following areas:

  • Behaviour support/management
  • Emotional help (including anger management and counselling)
  • Academic support (including intervention work, extended work experience specialised timetables and programmes)
  • Restorative Approaches
  • Peer mediation
  • Links to specialist external agencies when needed

The Pastoral system comes under the Wellbeing area, overseen by our Assistant Headteacher, Mr Isherwood.

The Form Tutor is always the first point of contact for parents/carers regarding any concerns or issues.

The Pastoral Team itself consists of 5 Heads of Year:

  • Head of Year 7 – Mr Riley
  • Head of Year 8 – Mr Green
  • Head of Year 9 – Mr Sykes
  • Head of Year 10 – Mrs Nixon
  • Head of Year 11 – Miss Shaw

This team deploys their combined experience of working with our young people and providing academic and emotional support in a number of ways. The pastoral staff knows the students in their year groups extremely well and continuously monitor their progress in all aspects of school life. For any students causing concern, referrals for support and intervention can be made by the pastoral support team, classroom teachers, parents/carers, support staff and the students themselves through a self‐referral process. Other Links to the Pastoral Team is our inclusion team which includes the school’s SENCO, a Child Action North-West Counsellor, a BFC counsellor, a Wellbeing and Safeguarding Officer and an attached Attendance Officer. We also work closely with other support agencies such as the Local Authority social inclusion team, child and family support and many others.

How do Parents/Carers contact the Pastoral team at Burnley High School?

The first point of contact should be the Form Tutor followed by Head of Year or Pastoral Team responsible for your child. Your child’s Head of Year can be contacted initially on talktomyheadofyear@burnleyhigh.com You can also contact Reception on 01282 681950.

Operation Encompass

Burnley High School participates in Operation Encompass.

Operation Encompass is a unique Police and Education early intervention safeguarding partnership which ensures that a child’s school is informed, prior to the start of the next school day, that there has been an incident of Domestic Abuse to which the child or young person has been exposed, and which might then have an impact on them in school the following day.

Each school is informed of all Domestic Abuse incidents, not just those where an offence can be identified or those which are graded as high risk. The partnership recognises that all incidents of Domestic Abuse can be harmful to children and young people.

This information will be shared throughout the year, including school holidays and the weekends. Information will only be shared with the school by the police where it is identified that a young person was present, witnessed or was involved in a domestic abuse incident.

A nominated member of staff, known as a Key Adult, has been trained to liaise with the police. At Burnley High School our Key Adult is Mrs Fort. She will be able to use information that has been shared with her, in confidence, to ensure that the school makes provision for possible difficulties experienced by children or their families. The Key Adults will keep this information confidential, and will only share it on a need to know basis, for instance, to teaching staff for the child or young person. It will not be shared with other school students.

Operation Encompass was first introduced in Plymouth in February 2011, and has proved very effective in providing appropriate and timely support to young people affected by domestic abuse. This initiative has been implemented across the whole of the Lancashire Police area.  If you would like some more information about it, you can view it online at www.operationencompass.org.

We are keen to offer the best support possible for our pupils and a recent review of Operation Encompass showed that it is beneficial and supportive for all those involved. For any questions relating to this please speak to Mrs Fort.

Arbor and Correspondence

Here at Burnley High School, we believe it is vitally important that we stay connected with Parents/Carers and that those lines of communication are open and honest, with responses provided as soon as possible. We will use Arbor to send home all written communication.

Guidance for Parents and Carers

  • We recommend that parents and carers check their child’s phone and tablet every night. Ensure you know your child’s passcodes and passwords.
  • We encourage children to use their devices whilst supervised to reduce risk.
  • We advise parents and carers to talk to their child about keeping safe online.
  • If parents haven’t done so already, they should consider setting up parental controls on mobiles and tablets in order to monitor usage and minimise risk of children using inappropriate apps and websites.
  • If you are concerned about your child’s online activity or if they have been contacted by an unknown person, we advise you to report inappropriate contact/content.
  • Please contact Lancashire Police or email safeguarding@burnleyhigh.com

Useful websites or apps for parents/carers: 

 

Head of Year 7 – Mr Riley

Head of Year 8 – Mr Green

Head of Year 9 – Mr Sykes

Head of Year 10 – Mrs Nixon

Head of Year 11 – Miss Shaw

“I love BHS because it really does feel like a family. All staff and students know each other, are extremely supportive of one another and show amazing levels of respect throughout the school. There really isn’t another school like it!”

Miss Yates