Protocol for Addressing Concerns about Schools and Whistleblowing: 

On rare occasions TISUK is contacted by third parties who raise concerns about schools. These may or may not be schools that have been accredited by us and achieved our school award. The purpose of this protocol is to clarify the steps that TISUK takes in response to concerns raised. 

Award Winning Schools: 

1. Concerns received are initially forwarded to the Strategic Lead for Awards, the Director of Operations and Training and the Director of Education and National Strategy for consideration. 
2. If the concerns are deemed to indicate that the school may be using approaches or practice that do not meet the high standards of our award criteria, we will notify them immediately in writing. 
3. At the time of writing, we will suspend promoting the school as an award-winning school, this will include removing the school from the website until such time as we have been able to complete our investigation into the concerns raised. 
4. For concerns that relate to a specific event, incident or approach we will work with school leaders to clarify what has happened and to agree the appropriate steps that may need to be taken to ensure that practice reflects the standards expected in our award. 
5. For concerns that are complex or indicate systemic poor practice over time we will talk to the school about re accreditation. Reaccreditation will require schools to reapply for their award in writing followed by an assessment visit led by a senior consultant. 
6. Upon successful resolution of concerns and if required upon completion of, schools will be promoted on our website in the usual way. 
7. We will inform third parties of the steps we will be taking in response to their concerns but will not inform them of the outcome of the process.
8. As an organisation we will remain open minded, non-judgemental, and empathic throughout the process. We hope that schools will welcome the opportunity to work with us to review their practice while recognising it is their right to decline. If a school feels unable to participate in the process, they will sadly be removed from our register of Award-Winning Schools. They will no longer be able to use our logo on their website to promote themselves as a Trauma Informed School. 

Non-Award-Winning Schools

We are occasionally contacted by members of the public, parents, staff or other professionals with concerns about schools that are not directly affiliated to us. These may be schools that are currently undertaking the training or may have undertaken training with other organisations and are referring to themselves as Trauma Informed Schools. 

Where the school is undertaking our training, we would contact the school to raise awareness of the concern with them and offer to support them in any way we can to support them to develop their practice or address the concerns. 

We would notify the third party of the steps we have taken. 

Where schools are not known to us, we would refer the third party to the school’s complaints policy and suggest that they contact them directly to discuss these. 

 Safeguarding 

Where concerns raised indicate a safeguarding concern, we would escalate this in line with our safeguarding policy.  Our role is to ensure that action has been taken by the Designated Safeguarding Lead (DSL)in line with their own policies or if appropriate the Local Area Designated Officer (LADO) in line with KCSIE 2023 guidelines. 

Whistleblowing

Where school staff raise concerns about their school or organisation, we will anonymise all information we share with the school to protect the identity of the staff member. However, where safeguarding concerns are raised with us, we may need to share specific details of incidents that may identify the individual staff member. We would always discuss this with the whistleblower prior to informing the school.