St Mark's is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children. We ensure that all staff, governors and volunteers are aware of these expectations from the moment they start working with us. They are all regularly trained and kept up to date with new safeguarding updates.

We have a number of policies and procedures in place that contribute to our safeguarding commitment, including our Child Protection and Safeguarding Policy which can be viewed on the policies section of our website, please click here.

Key Contacts:

• Our Designated Safeguarding Lead is Karl Luckhurst (Head of School)
• Our Deputy Designated Safeguarding Leads are Catherine Cottingham (Executive Headteacher) and Louisa Burvill (HLTA) 
• Our Safeguarding Governor is Peter Smyth.

Sometimes we may need to share information and work in partnership with other agencies, when there are concerns about a child’s welfare. We will ensure that our concerns about our pupils are discussed with parents/carers first, unless we have reason to believe that such a move would be contrary to the child’s welfare. We actively support the Government’s Prevent Agenda to counter radicalism and extremism. Our Staff and Governors are trained to deal with Prevent, as part of regular Safeguarding training and updates.

Useful links

• https://www.eastsussex.gov.uk/children-families/worried-about-a-child - If you are worried about a child please use follow links.
• https://www.nspcc.org.uk/keeping-children-safe/reporting-abuse/report/ - NSPCC is a great resource to help inform and prevent child abuse.
• https://learning.nspcc.org.uk/safeguarding-child-protection-schools - An overview from the NSPCC about why safeguarding is schools is so important.

Operation Encompass

Operation Encompass has been designed to provide early reporting to schools of any domestic abuse incidents that occur in which a child was present, ordinarily resides at the incident location or with an involved party. We know that children can be significantly affected through witnessing or being exposed to domestic abuse and this operation will allow us to better support our pupils and their families. In the most recent version of Keeping Children Safe in Education 2024, it has been recognised that children who experience Domestic Abuse within the home are also considered to be victims.

A nominated member of staff, known as a Key Adult, will be trained to liaise with the police. At St Mark's CEP School our Key Adult is our safeguarding lead, Karl Luckhurst. He will be able to use information that has been shared with him, in confidence, to ensure that the right support is available should it be required by a child and / or their family. Please click on the link to go to their website, which has more information on the initiative.

Keeping children safe online:

Children today live in a digital world. The development of digital technology and the Internet has revolutionised how children (and adults) live their lives. Used appropriately this technology improves and enhances their lives in many ways. It also, however, presents opportunities for unacceptable behaviour and criminality among a small minority of people. We incorporate Online Safety into a range of areas of our curriculum, these include PSHE, Computing, Drama, English and Topic (included when researching about different History/Geography themes).  

The continuing development of ‘smartphones’ and mobile Internet devices means that children can be ‘online’ at all times, which further highlights the need for children, young people and parents to be aware of the dangers and how best to stay safe while enjoying the benefits of digital technology.

If you require any further information or advice then please speak to our Safeguarding Team: 

Mr Luckhurst, Miss Cottingham and Miss Burvill via the office or dsl@st-marks.e-sussex.sch.uk