Deputy Designated Safeguarding Lead

Deputy Designated Safeguarding Lead

Summary

We are looking for a Deputy Designated Safeguarding Lead (DDSL) to work closely with the Designated Safeguarding Lead (DSL) to promote and safeguard the welfare of all pupils across the school. You will play a key role in ensuring that safeguarding remains a central priority within the school, supporting a strong culture of vigilance, openness and professional curiosity.

If you are a DDSL who is looking for an opportunity to grow, inspire and develop, this may be the role for you. You will contribute to creating a safe, inclusive and supportive school environment where every pupil is protected from harm and has the opportunity to thrive.

The development of our students academically, personally and professionally is at the heart of everything we do at Harris Academy Battersea. Our values of Knowledge, Integrity and Resilience embody the qualities we seek to promote and expect to see in our young people. You will take a key role in the communication and reiteration of our vision and mission to our students: ‘We develop aspirational young people to thrive in a changing world'.

If you are committed to these values and want to make a real difference to the lives of our young people, then we would welcome an application.

The actual salary for this role will be £36,630-£38,315 (39 weeks per year, 40 hours per week).

About Us

Harris Academy Battersea is a mixed state secondary school serving a truly comprehensive community in the heart of London. We are an Ofsted Outstanding school with a track record of delivering fantastic outcomes year on year for our students. In 2023, Ofsted visited the academy and judged us as remaining outstanding, commenting on our “highly ambitious curriculum”, the “exceptionally high quality of education” provided and noted that “behaviour in the school is very strong.” Nevertheless, we are extremely ambitious for our school and as we seek to continue to grow and develop, we are looking for more brilliant people to join us.

Our Academy is centred on the values of Knowledge, Integrity and Resilience and these underpin the way we work for both students and staff. Our staff are inclusive, diverse and committed to our mission: we develop aspirational young people to thrive in a changing world.

HABS offers a broad, academic and challenging curriculum founded on six key curriculum aims:

• To develop deep, long-lasting knowledge
• To develop students into accomplished readers, writers and orators
• To provide experiences within and beyond the classroom that enrich learning and ensure students can make informed choices about their futures
• To equip students to challenge injustice in all its forms
• To enable students to understand how they learn
• To support students to reflect on their choices and values to improve themselves and their community

These aims underpin all elements of our curriculum, and we see our core academic curriculum and wider personal development curriculum as intrinsically linked. All staff at the Academy contribute to the personal development of our students through their roles as tutors and through their contributions to the wider life of the academy.

A thriving school can only function with fantastic staff, and our vision is to make teaching at HABS both enjoyable and sustainable. The wellbeing of staff underpins every decision we make, and we seek to ensure that every member of staff can enjoy a work-life-balance enabling them to bring their best to work each day.

At HABS, professional growth and development is central to our mission. Our professional development motto is ‘improve, not prove' and leaders are relentlessly focussed on supporting staff in getting even better through a wide range of internal and external training opportunities.

As a part of the Harris Federation, all staff in the Academy benefit from being part of our network of more than fifty primary and secondary academies across London. Vibrant networks of subject experts meet regularly and teachers can access bespoke support from our central teams of consultants.

For more information about what we do and who we are, we encourage you to visit our website here as well as our careers page here and explore!

Main Areas of Responsibility

Your responsibilities will include:

• Managing safeguarding concerns and making referrals to external agencies, including Children's Social Care, the Police and the Channel programme
• Supporting staff with safeguarding referrals and safeguarding best practice
• Delivering and coordinating whole-school safeguarding training and awareness activities
• Preparing safeguarding reports and presenting information to governors, leadership teams and external inspectors
• Managing and monitoring CPOMS, ensuring accurate record-keeping and staff compliance
• Supporting early help, child protection and statutory safeguarding processes
• Attending and contributing to child protection and safeguarding meetings as required
• Ensuring staff understand and follow safeguarding and child protection policies and procedures
• Identifying and supporting vulnerable students, including those with SEND, young carers and children in need
• Maintaining accurate, secure and confidential safeguarding records
• Promoting effective information sharing with staff, safeguarding partners and external agencies
• Supporting the academy's Prevent duty and advising staff on safeguarding risks, including radicalisation
• Promoting online safety and supporting students to stay safe in digital environments
• Raising awareness of the additional safeguarding risks faced by students with SEND
• Keeping safeguarding knowledge up to date through regular training, professional development and sector updates
• Promoting a culture in which students are listened to and their views are taken into account in safeguarding practice

Qualifications & Experience

We would like to hear from you if you have have:

• A clear and good understanding of safeguarding issues, theory and practice, with particular regard to:
• refer cases of suspected abuse to the local authority children's social care as required;
• support staff who make referrals to local authority children's social care;
• refer cases to the Channel programme where there is a radicalisation concern as required;
• support staff who make referrals to the Channel programme;
• refer cases where a person is dismissed or left due to risk/harm to a child to the Disclosure and Barring Service as required; and
• refer cases where a crime may have been committed to the Police as required.
• Sound knowledge of Microsoft software with knowledge of using a management Information system for input and export of student data Knowledge of the range of agencies that work with students and their families.
• Training in child protection and safeguarding procedures
• Basic knowledge of first aid; eg. Emergency first aid
• Knowledge of many of the social issues facing students from disadvantaged backgrounds
• Good understanding of a range of welfare issues that may be affecting students and their families

For a full job description and person specification, please download the Job Pack.

Next Steps

Please note: we may hold interviews as and when applications are received and we reserve the right to offer to a candidate prior to the closing date. We only accept applications submitted online via our careers website and which are completed before the closing deadline. With this in mind, we encourage you to apply as soon as possible and advise you check the job information as per the listing on our careers site.

Professional Development & Benefits

Our people are at the heart of our success. We have developed a strong culture of collaboration and best practice, with professional development and caree