New amendments have been made to the Tasmanian Guidelines for the re-registration of a non-government school (Guidelines) by the Non-Government Schools Registration Board. The revised Guidelines (version 3.0) were approved by the Minister for Education in July. The changes focus on adherence to the National Principles for Child Safe Organisations and evidence of how schools implement and review all their policies and procedures.
The Education Act 2016 (Tas) provides for the Non-Government Schools Registration Board to make guidelines for the application process of non-government schools registration which is then approved by the Education Minister. As discussed in a previous article, the Guidelines aim to provide schools with clear directions regarding what the Board requires in assessing compliance with the Tasmanian Standards of Registration and Renewal of Registration of Non-government Schools. These Standards are set out in Schedules 3 and 4 to the Education Regulations 2017 (Tas), respectively.
Most of the recent amendments to the Guidelines have come about as a result of the recommendations from the Royal Commission into Institutional Response to Child Sexual Abuse (Royal Commission). The revised Guidelines ensure that schools will better protect children through their policies and procedures which will, in turn, further embed a culture of child safety in non-government schools. Most significantly, the Guidelines now require that schools adopt the 10 National Principles for Child Safe Organisations in the development of their child-safe policies and procedures.
The following sections of the Guidelines have been amended from the previous version (2019):
Schools should ensure that their policies and procedures state a period for review and that they comply with it. According to the revised Guidelines, a period of three to five years is best practice.
This Standard has had the most significant number of additions and changes. It now requires schools to demonstrate a public commitment to the National Principles for Child Safe Organisations and the corresponding Child Safe Standards as identified by the Royal Commission through the development and implementation of child safe policies and procedures. Regular reviews, risk assessments and ongoing systems of training and compliance must also be applied and evidenced within these policies. Child safe policies must address peer-to-peer relationships, as well as staff-student relationships.
In addition, the Guidelines note, under the sub heading of Child Safe Policies and Procedures:
“Schools that operate a boarding school must ensure that all child welfare policies and procedures extend to the boarding school and boarding school staff. Schools are also required to meet standard AS 5725:2015 and any subsequent updated Australian Standard”.
As noted by Richard Stokes (CEO of the Australian Boarding Schools Association (ABSA)):
“the Standard for Australian schools and residences was written to ensure excellent practice amongst the boarding schools in this country”.
AS 5725:2015 Boarding Standard for Australian schools and residences should not be feared by schools but instead should be welcomed as providing a clear standard of what policies and procedures should be introduced to ensure the welfare of boarding students.
Standard 5 also notes that child safety measures should be under continuous review in all schools including:
Standard 5 also includes an additional staff code of conduct requirement. This requires that schools must have a staff code of conduct that clearly and explicitly identifies acceptable and unacceptable forms of behaviour between staff and students.
Record keeping is also addressed in the changes in Standard 5 of the amended Guidelines. Schools are required to maintain and store records on many aspects of students’ time at the school. Specifically the requirements for record keeping outlined in the following documents issued by the Tasmanian State Archivist must be followed: Disposal Freeze for Records Relating to Children and Records Relating to Child Abuse (DA2520).
Minor changes have been made to this Standard in the amended Guidelines to require that staff induction, performance management and professional learning all include an ongoing review of child safety elements.
Standard 11 has been amended to provide for additional complaints management requirements in response to the National Principles for Child Safe Organisations. A school’s child safe policies and procedures will need to ensure that:
Although not noted specifically within the Guidelines, schools should pay particular attention to Principle 6 and Principle 9 of the National Principles for Child Safe Organisations when they review their complaint handling policies to ensure that they are child-focused. The National Office of Child Safety’s Complaint Handling Guide: Upholding the rights of children and young people is also instructive.
Amendments to the Guidelines in Standard 12 stipulate that student behaviour policies should clearly state types of behaviour that are unacceptable, and their consequences. These policies should include unacceptable student-student behaviour and student-student relationships.
Standard 13 has been amended to outline that schools may be asked to provide supporting evidence of policies or procedures in relation to other types of ongoing legislative and jurisdictional compliance.
Supporting evidence may be requested in relation to obligations of:
It is our understanding that the Non-Government Schools Registration Board and the Office of the Education Registrar have recently written to the principals of all Tasmanian non-government schools to advise them of the availability of the amended Guidelines. Within this correspondence, schools were advised that there is an expectation that they will work to implement the new evidentiary requirements with significant progress by this time in 2022.
It was noted that the Department of Education has already commenced the development of protocols, forms and policies that schools are encouraged to adapt for their own purposes.