Should parents be told about new safeguarding measures enacted after primary school principal investigated by police for sexual assault on pupil over 8 weeks at the school?

[bernadette1984]

We recently had a parent publicly out, via the school Mum's WhatsApp group, that my Year 5 daughter's primary school principal was accused recently of sexual abuse against a year 6, 11 year old, school girl inside his office at the school over an 8 week period (every Friday). It is alleged by the two girls that in the office with the Principal that he regularly stroked the arm, held her hand, and played with her hair, after pulling the blinds, locking the door and using his coat to cover the view through the door. And that he complimented her and in the 11 year old girl student's words, made her "feel special". He denied the allegations, and says they were only studying.

The police were called. The school and police both found the allegations were not malicious but could be neither proven, nor disproven, and the girls have now left the school and the Principal continues in his role.

The police have said in a written email to the alleged victim's Mum, that it doesn't "pass the threshold of evidence to prosecute", "but the behaviour remains of concern", and "the information remains retained on his file, and may be referenced in future safeguarding processes". The school, after the parent divulged what was alleged to have happen, and the police's view on it, finally confessed an "incident" had happened. And it says they have now "introduced a new range of safer working practices" but refuse to say what they are. And that they have also introduced a policy that says "all small group work should be visible" but refuse to show any parents the policy or disclose why small group work only needs to be visible now.

I have emailed the school 4 times asking to meet with the school informally (as is their policy on their website) about my daughter's safeguarding at the school and safeguarding in general (but not the allegations as they say these are confidential which I accept) and they ignored all my emails (unlike any other general email I've sent over the years). The school also removed the Principal from the year 6 residential 3 night trip due to parent complaints and concerns (but won't confirm he will be banned from future trips, so that concerns me, that my girl will likely be in the trip with him overnight from school grounds for 3 nights unsupervised, considering his behaviour that police are "concerned about" carried on for 8 weeks without any staff raising concern, as it was the girls that finally reported him).

Should I be concerned? And be unhappy with this response, and feel that they should tell us what these "safer working practices" that they wrote to us about are? And should they provide us with a copy of the new small groups working policy they have introduced? And should we just let him go on next year's trip with different 11 year old girls? For context, most parents seem happy enough that new safeguarding measures (the new "safer working practices", and new "small groups working" policy), which remain a secret, are said to have been introduced.

Or should I just carry on with my life, like most parents, and forget about it, now the police are not pursuing charges, and the girls accusing the principle have now left the school?

If not, what do I do now, considering the school just ignores any email I send asking politely to meet to discuss my child's safeguarding and current safeguarding in general at the school. I know approx 30 parents (out of 300) are not happy, so do we collaborate somehow, or tell Ofsted? Or how else do we get the school to even discuss, let alone reply to an email asking them to discuss safeguarding, or to even tell us what the current safeguarding measures or arrangements are at the school now, or should I just trust them, and let these new measures remain a secret?

Help please

Has that been definitely established - that he lowered the blinds, locked the door and blocked the visibility through the door - even if the alleged abuse hasn't been?

If so that's absolutely unacceptable and there should be a full and open enquiry by the governors. I'm a man and have worked in schools in roles that sometimes involve 1:1 activity with a single child. I haven't made it a mission to keep up with every safeguarding directive but I've got enough awareness of the gist and basic common sense that I would NEVER do that. A headteacher, part of whose job it is to be totally on top of such things and confirm that they're properly addressed throughout the school, has no excuse.

I'm sorry but part of the reality of safeguarding is that it's not enough to not abuse. You also need to take simple steps to ensure you're not perceived as abusing, either by children themselves or by other members of the school community. Most of these steps are not rocket science - like not deliberately obscuring visibility where it would otherwise be clear when you're with a single child.

There might be a perfectly innocent explanation - maybe he had to lock the door in case a zombie apocalypse broke out during the session for example. But I don't think there is, and anyway that isn't the point.

The police reported concern about his behaviour. For me that means that he either admitted to touching the child or that he was out of sight with the children or both. If he was fully visible with the children and disputed touching them what would there be to record concern over? Surely they'd then just say that there was no proof he had touched anyone and no-one saw anything?

Regardless of what happened - if you don't trust the HT and don't want him around your daughter then you just remove her. There's no other choice. If I felt so strongly against it like you do, it wouldn't be an issue - we'd move DC to another school. When the trust between school and parent breaks down, there's no point continuing and its time to move. No more discussion and trying to decipher the policies etc as you clearly wouldn't be comfortable anyway, so just remove her.

And as for DH not letting you move schools.... well, that's a whole other thread.

@RunMeOverthe locking door is disputed and his word against the 2 girls. The rest has been established and is why the school has introduced this new "small groups working policy" that requires visibility, however we are being asked to trust them on this as I have asked 5 times for this policy and they are refusing to produce it. So whether the staff even knows this policy now exists, let alone have been trained on it I have serious doubts about.

I'm no expert and not worked in schools like yiu but I find it surprising that only now they have nade it a requirement for any 221s to be visible and not out of sight.

@anyolddinosauryes their concern, and the reason the school tells us they have had to introduce new policies around small group work being visible that they won't share, is that he was not visible for 8 weeks every Friday, while helping the 2 girls study for their SATs. No staff raised concerns. It stopped after the second girl reported it a month after the first girl reported it.

The police understandably are concerned by this behaviour and recorded it on his police file but the allegations are just his word against the 2 girls.