Keeping Kids Safe Beyond Compliance: Essential Child Safety Tips for Parents

As debate, discussion and reflections continue about recent news reports regarding abuse and harm of children in Early Education settings many parents may be feeling anxious about dropping children off. I've had lots of conversations with parents over the past 24 hours and have found myself reminding them that not all services have these problems and most people working with children really do care about them. In this blog article I'm going to share some practical advice for parents about what to look for in a child safe organisation.

What does "Keeping Kids Safe Beyond Compliance" mean?

Organisations will often have compliance indicators or checklists that they have to do for accreditation or to meet regulatory audits. Whilst this is important it can become a tick box process, where only the bare minimum is done, simply to pass inspection. Keeping children safe requires a broad range of approaches and ultimately a culture where children’s wellbeing and safety is the priority rather than an organisation simply ticking the boxes.

What can parents look for to assess whether an organisation is safe for their children?

As a parent/guardian there are things that you can look out for and questions you can ask l to ensure that services are prioritising the safety and wellbeing of your children.

Questions to ask yourself

• Do I feel welcome?

• Does the service communicate with me in a way that I can understand?

• Do I know who I can speak to if I have concerns?

• If I have raised concerns in the past have I been listened to, acknowledged and provided with a response?

• Can I access relevant policies? Are they up to date?

• Do my child's educators appear suitable to be working with children? Would they know what to do if there was an issue impacting the safety of a child?

• Does the service provide opportunities to give feedback?

• Are there opportunities for families to have involvement? (Parent committees, volunteering etc) If so what processes are in place to ensure safety (Working With Children Checks, Codes of Conduct, Staff supervision etc)

  
  

Questions to ask your child (depending on their age)

• What do they enjoy most about kinder?

• Do they feel welcome?

• Who would they go to at kinder if they felt worried about something?

Questions to ask the service

• Have they implemented The Child Safe Standards or The National Principles?

• What child protection training have staff received and how often do they do it?

• Can you access their Child Safety and Wellbeing Policy (or other relevant child safety policies), Code of Conduct and complaint handling policy?

• How are staff, volunteers and contractors assessed for suitability to work with or around children?

Things to look out for

• How do the staff interact with children?

• Do children appear comfortable interacting with staff?

• How do staff interact with each other in the presence of children?

• How involved are senior staff and leadership in the day to day interactions between educators and children?

• Is child safety information displayed within the service or communicated to families regularly?

Read more of our blog posts for more information about child safe organisations.