What is safeguarding?

Safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children refers to the process of protecting children from maltreatment, preventing the impairment of health or development, ensuring the that children grow up in circumstances consistent with the provision of safe and effective care and taking action to enable all children to have the best outcomes.

Our pledge

We recognise our moral and statutory responsibility to safeguard and promote the welfare of all pupils. We endeavour to provide a safe and welcoming environment where children are respected and valued. We are alert to the signs of abuse and neglect and follow our procedures to ensure that children receive effective support, protection and justice.

The Safeguarding Team

Meet the Safeguarding Team at Lymm High School: (click to enlarge)

Click here to see a flowchart, which illustrates what action should be taken and by whom when there are concerns about a child.

What to do if you have a concern

If you have a concern about your child, a relative or another pupil at Lymm High School please contact:

Designated Safeguarding Lead: Ruth Ball rball@lymmhigh.org.uk 01925 755458 (ext. 258)
Deputy Designated Safeguarding Lead: Kerry Hayes khayes@lymmhigh.org.uk 01925 755458

You can also speak to any other member of the safeguarding team using the main school number
01925 755458.

Student Services – Pastoral Managers

The Pastoral team plays a key role in supporting the whole child. Each year group is cared for by a Head of Year and a Pastoral Manager who have an overview of all aspects of pastoral care across the year group, supporting and caring for students and families.

The Student Services team include the Attendance Officer, Safeguarding Officers, Emotional Health & Wellbeing Designated Lead, Key Workers, Mentors, Counsellors and First Aid. Student Services work closely with the SEND Team and SENCO ensuring wraparound care.

The Designated Safeguarding Lead and Pastoral Managers ensure the safeguarding of our most vulnerable students who are at high risk: their safety and wellbeing is our number one priority. The Pastoral Team are trained in dealing with a range of mental health and wellbeing issues, supporting and signposting students to the appropriate in-school support and self-help resources.

Liaising with Social Care
Completion of Early Help Assessments
Attendance and contributions at Child Protection Conferences, Core Group meetings, Child in Need meetings
Completion of Early Help Assessment and referrals to the Family Outreach Team for support with the aim of supporting identified families
Leading on the care, guidance and the educational plans for our Children in Care
Planning and delivering a Mental Health Awareness day.

ChatHealth

ChatHealth is a new text messaging service to answer the health and wellbeing questions of young people, parents and carers across Warrington. Bridgewater Community Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust has teamed up with ChatHealth, an award-winning messaging helpline platform, to provide the service.

The text number for Warrington’s 11–19 Young People’s Service is: 07507 330101

It will offer a safe way for users to get in touch anonymously and confidentially with a healthcare professional via a mobile phone. Professionals will be on hand to help with a variety of health and wellbeing issues, including anxiety, bullying, child development and sexual health. Evidence has shown that young people in particular like the fact that ChatHealth enables them to make discreet contact with health professionals, which they found to be less embarrassing, quick and easy, anonymous and non-judgemental.

Early Help

The purpose of early help is to prevent any issues from getting worse by offering families support at the right time.

Any professional working with your family, such as those based in schools, health services, and in voluntary sector organisations, can offer early help services as soon as they can see that advice, support and/or intervention may be needed.

Early help works best when it’s offered to the whole family and when services are delivered jointly by professionals.

Early help assessments

Early Help Assessments (EHA) are how professionals identify and assess your family’s needs.

We complete the assessment with your family and a range of different organisations, such as schools and health services. This is so the support given meets the needs of the whole family. An EHA means everyone can make sure the support is working and making a difference to your family. It also helps to improve local services for everyone.

Each locality team is made up of staff from different professional backgrounds including early years, children centres, family outreach, youth services and other specialist services. Locality teams work with other partner agencies such as schools, health, police, community safety team, housing providers, probation and substance misuse providers to support children and families.

Please contact Student Services if you would like to discuss an early help referral.

For more information, click here.

Operation Encompass

Lymm High School is committed to working in partnership with local relevant organisations to safeguard and protect children across Cheshire and provide the best possible care and support for our pupils.

In conjunction with Cheshire Police, Lymm High School is part of a project called Operation Encompass. The purpose of Operation Encompass is to safeguard and support children and young people who have been involved in, heard or witnessed a domestic abuse incident. Following such an incident, children will often arrive at school distressed, upset, worried and unprepared. Operation Encompass aims to ensure that appropriate school staff (called Key Adults) are made aware early enough to support children and young people in a way that means they feel safe and included. This is a valuable initiative that means we can continue to support and help children and families within our school community when they need it the most.

If you would like to speak to someone further about Operation Encompass, or require any additional information, please do not hesitate to contact Mrs R Ball – Designated Senior Lead for Safeguarding and Key Adult.

You can find out more by visiting www.operationencompass.org