Case Study:
St Peters C. of E. Primary School
Having considered the ever-changing nature of the digital world, it was clear to St Peter’s C of E Primary School that they needed to empower their whole school community to keep pupils safe online.
Ultimately deciding to sign up for our Certified School package, the school since has showcased how highly they prioritise online safety.
Ashleigh Bebbington, Computing Co-Ordinator, is delighted with the impact that National Online Safety membership has had so far – and hopes to continue embedding our training and resources.
Keeping up to date with online safeguarding
Reflecting on the influence of several national lockdowns (such as precipitating a shift to remote learning), St Peter’s C of E Primary had to adapt to new ways of safeguarding their pupils when they were online.
Ashleigh explained: “We felt that we needed to do something more for our online safety – especially with how everything moved online during the pandemic.”
“We wanted to get ahead of the game with safeguarding our children and supporting them with online safety.” she added.
“We were seeing snippets of the National Online Safety programme on social media, and it looked good.”
Accessible for the whole school community
Protecting children online is a collective responsibility which sits with not only the teaching staff, but with the whole school community.
The breadth of resources available on our learning hub – and the ease with which these can be rolled out to staff, parents, carers and pupils – was an essential factor in the school’s decision.
Ashleigh pointed out: “It’s supporting everyone, not just teachers. It's supporting the children, every single staff member, governors, parents and stakeholders.”
Speaking in specific terms, Ashleigh revealed that there has been a high uptake of the training and resources among parents and carers: “We’ve had parents signing up, looking around and using the platform. After Christmas, I'm going to be doing a parents’ meeting all about National Online Safety.”
“I'll be showing them how the platform works and where they can find things, giving them a tour of the National Online Safety website.” she elaborated.
Our award-winning online learning hub
At National Online Safety, we’ve made it straightforward to track and monitor the progression of staff development on our platform.
Ashleigh explains how useful this has been for the school: “It's good that you can set watchlists. It means that people aren't having to scroll through all the training, which could be quite overwhelming. They've got specific tasks that they need to complete.”
“The different features on the platform are fantastic: to be able to get that overview of the staff and see where they are up to,” she continued.
Of our award-winning safeguarding courses, Ashleigh commented: “It's really useful that the training is in modules as well.”
Flexible training for busy staff members
Their chosen online safety training had to be flexible to work for the school – something that we at National Online Safety were able to cater for.
Ashleigh said: “It gives staff that flexibility. You're not tied in to being at a specific place at a specific time. Staff can do it at their own leisure, as long as it’s completed by a certain date.”
Engaging children with online safety
Ashleigh explained how pupil feedback is pivotal when assessing the impact of an external provider. When it came to National Online Safety’s provision, the response has been overwhelmingly positive.
“We've started using the lesson plans in assemblies, which has had a good response from the children,” she revealed.
“We've had children disclosing bits of information to us, based on the content they’ve seen. I don't think we would have got that information had we not signed up to National Online Safety. The content wouldn’t have been delivered in the same way,” she concluded.