Educators

Education practitioners may be the only professionals who have regular contact with young people as well as their families.

That is why education professionals play an important role in identifying and protecting young people from harm. Educators should help young people:

• feel part of the school community
• feel safe at school
• have good relationships with young people
• create a culture that values young people
• have a culture that values and supports emotional and mental wellbeing.

Education settings must take reasonable measures to minimise the risks of harm to the well-being of young people. This includes consideration of the appropriateness of their policies for:

• child criminal exploitation
• trafficking
• absenteeism
• missing education
• temporary and fixed exclusions.

Staff knowledge and awareness

Professionals must receive appropriate training aimed at embedding professional curiosity into routine practice with proportionate responses to the risks of harm identified. The should have access to:

• clear information, advice, and guidance about the warning signs of child criminal exploitation
• their safeguarding duties under the Social Services Well-Being (Wales) Act 2014
• how to make appropriate child protection referrals.

Education professionals must utilise existing electronic case management systems such as MyConcern and CPoms to record and share information that can be used to identify patterns and trends regarding child criminal exploitation. This information should be used at the local level to inform safeguarding approaches.

Practitioners must understand General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and what information should be shared with multi-agency partners through multi-agency child exploitation (MACE) and multi-strategy discussions and meetings.

Designated Safeguarding Leads

Education settings must have Designated Safeguarding Leads, with specialist knowledge of child criminal exploitation and up-to-date links with local and national services and organisations. This facilitates referral processes, and enables the provision of the ‘right support at the right time’ for young people.

Education settings should also have a named police officer who liaises with them regarding local activity and preventative initiatives for child criminal exploitation and other forms of harm.

Guidance for educators

For further guidance for healthcare practitioners, including warning signs for child criminal exploitation, see pages 38-46 of the Practitioner Toolkit.