CPOMS entries/process

[Findingpeace28]

Hi all,
A bit of advice/insight please. I heard of CPOMs for the first time this year. Since then, I’ve seen some of the entries made about my children, mainly my older son. Most of the entries were news to me and I’m wondering if anyone knows what the correct process is for safeguarding:

1. should the school have notified me of concerns recorded on CPOMs and recorded my response?
2. what are my options if I want to escape a complaint regarding how the school is using CPOMs because I personally don’t see how it can be right to record incidents surreptitiously when there could have been a perfectly innocent explanation for their concern/observation.
3. what is the guidance regarding informing parents about this system?

Thank you in advance for any help.

You’d think so but it seems that Social Services have now also lost all common sense/ sense of perspective (or maybe they’ve always been like this considering the amount of online chatter about them). And you’re right, it’s all depressing reading and the safeguarding policy I find too convoluted. I can’t imagine that they have all this time to blow things out of proportion when there must be loads more serious cases out there. My sons had almost 100% attendance and if they couldn’t attend I’d always call to let school know why. The current social worker report says I’m a good mum who provides everything, but at the same time, I’ve perpetrated ‘emotional abuse’, from 5 or 6 CPOMS entries. You can’t make it up and it’ll be funny if it wasn’t so distressing to be labelled an abusive parent.

We record all parental contact too. Not casual playground conversations about them finishing their pudding or doing well in maths. But if you ring up or we ring you up or there is a dojo conversation.

The last time I phoned my own child's school up I could hear her tutor typing as I was speaking, like a court reporter.

@Skelligsfeathers Obviously, I don't know that, but I was trying to explain how CPOMS could be used to evidence a referral on the basis of various small things. At my school, the bar for a referral is very high, but I also know that varies a lot between schools and systems (county or otherwise).

I do think it's right to log everything. I also think that DSLs have an awful job, damned if they do and damned if they don't.

First of all, if you read my post, there’s no where I wrote that school alerted SS. I’m fact, what I said was school didn’t take any escalation action. Also, what makes you think I’m female? Also, your experience may be that the bar is exceptionally high, but please don’t project that on other people. Lastly, the one thing you said which rings true is that emotional abuse should be extremely hard to prove so cue my shock when 5 wildly divergent CPOMS entries seem to be the basis for that so far. And I’m not sure if they’re categorically alleging that or saying they’re looking at it.

@Findingpeace28 I would log parental contact. What the DSL thinks of that is above my pay-grade! Also, I'm not aware of how the guidance works in primary schools. Hope it gets resolved.

Please don’t feel you need to justify yourself to anyone. You’re absolutely right not to come on here assuming that everyone is guilty of something. I totally got your point and I thank you for your open-mindedness.

Okay, thank you 😊. What’s the DLS again?

I think you probably need to work with social services now as your focus.

Sorry, slipped into edu-speak without thinking! DSL = Designated Safeguarding Lead. You might also encounter the LADO = Local Authority Designated (Safeguarding) Officer.

I will do although it galls me and makes me physically sick. Thank you 😊

Haha, no problem. Okay, got it. Ty

Sadly I agree that the bar is set high. I'm no longer a teacher but we would always log concerns as part of a bigger picture. You're focusing on the wrong thing here - the ins and outs of cpoms isn't relevant it's the fact that 5 concerns have been logged by people concerned for your child. Work with social services

Cpoms replaced pen and paper. It is a recording system. Any concern about a child however minor is recorded. No you won't be informed of every concern a staff member records. Complaining about this will get you nowhere.

Schools cannot call a parent everytime an entry is made on CPOMS, there are also circumstances where something happens or a series of things happens and then the school don't investigate but call the LADO first. Yes contact with parents is recorded, incidents that happen at school, comments made by child - it is a record. For social services to be involved, there must have been a trigger as they can't just look at records.

A particularly combative tone over the phone is also something that could form a CPOMS entry. Because it's not always what somebody says as much as how they say that can lead somebody to think 'I'd better record this' when they're working somewhere that doesn't use it for absolutely everything.

How have you been given access to the cpoms log?

He hasn't said that he has. In fact he said

"Thanks. I did request all the information they’d recorded but they refused. I’d let it be until I received some paperwork from them with some more records and a conclusion that emotional abuse had been taking place."

The fact that you think an entry detailing that your son came to school upset with no coat having had a cold breakfast is ‘ridiculous’ speaks volumes!

I think 80% of what I log on CPOMS is probably not a problem. The issue comes becuase you don’t know which 80% is fine, and 20% which is not. The serious case reviews that happen after awful cases like Victoria Climbe and Danial Pelka have noted that lots of different people and agencies knew lots of little bits, and no one put the jigsaw together.

CPOMS allows more of that jigsaw to be seen.

The problem with CPoms and the safeguarding recording is it's not a standard set of criteria of what you report.

So one teacher in a school may not see an issue with a child not having a coat all week when it's 14° outside. Another may thinks that's too cold not to have a coat on them.

That's before you even consider some children don't feel the cold like others do.

You only have to look around the playground in autumn/ winter to see this spreads to parents as well.

Same about a child saying they didn't have breakfast.

Did they refuse? Are the family not able to afford it? Did they oversleep and it's unusual? A simple question to the parents and logging the answer can also be part of singing the problem.

Eg

Jonny said he was hungry at 9am and was tearful. He said he's not eaten any breakfast. Spoke to parent at pick up who said Jonny refused breakfast because he wanted CoCo pops and we only had cornflakes.

I'm sure SS will be In And out of it all turns out to be typical child stuff - especially because most of the time it's how they word things that cause the issue!

But although in most cases things are innocent. We need to keep on top so when they aren't these people don't slip through the net.

You can do a subject access request - it would be a redacted copy taking out other children's names.

I'm a DSL, have been in two secondaries and both use CPOMS.

OP probably knows about the incidents via social services, who will have asked school to share information they have on the family.

OP is unlikely to be given access to the CPOMS chronology even with a freedom if information request. I've dealt with two safeguard FoI requests - both were outright denied and nothing sent. Safeguarding always trumps data protection. If social services decide the child has no safeguarding risk, there is a chance a redacted version might be provided. If there are any safeguard rusks found, chances if seeing the file are slim.

That said, OP already knows the CPOMS entries of concern, since they've been shared to them through social services. So there isn't much to be gained by a FoI request anyway.

As for why parents aren't phoned - they often aren't for low level incidents where "watch and wait" is best. Parents would be asked only if the issue forms part of a larger pattern.

The process is that staff log a concern, and the designated safeguarding lead decides whether action is required. You can't remove a concern from the system once it has been logged. Every edit is tracked.

If the school didn't make a referral to social care, then there is something other than the school's own safeguarding records that have resulted in their involvement, and not just the 5 low level concerns logged by the school.

Cpoms records everything all communication to parents - everything it’s a central data base.

that wouldn’t be safeguarding that would be under communications.
however if you said ‘parent telephoned and Ben said he was crying at home and upset about a poem done in class, reassured mum of nature of the poem and reassured mum I Keep an eye on Ben and explained ww2 is a compulsory nc topic etc or whatever however mum still seemed anxious etc ‘
that would then go under communication and anxiety of the child box

for ss to be involved that is NOT a world war 2 poem.

for emotional abuse the child must have disclosed either one serious incident or a pattern of other smaller ones.

but no you don’t get to know what disclosures have been made Cpoms is a database. You don’t phone a parent necessarily and say ‘Ben said he doesn’t eat if he has a poor report at school’ - it is the well-being of the child not you. I imagine that you will be able to have that discussion with ss

As far as I am aware, if it is a maintained school you have the right to access anything related to your child. I think the rules are different for academies though. I am a teacher and we use CPOMS at our school. Every "incident" is shared with the head, deputies, SENCO and mentors. We have to record very concise and factual information, and if it has been discussed with a parent or carer. If we don't record that a parent or carer has been spoken to, then an action will be added by one of the above members of staff to make sure a parent or carer is spoken to. If this would put a child at risk, then the safeguarding lead would follow any steps needed. Each incident is categorised so related events can be picked out easily. We record all parent/ carer contact too, including face to face, emails and telephone contacts. If a child moves school and the next school uses CPOMS this can all be transferred across.