e-Safety

Technological development in recent years has made the world around us an exciting place where distances and circumstances maintain few barriers to the journeys of enquiring minds. At Penn Fields we value the enquiring minds within our school, striving to arm them with the confidence and skills to meet life’s challenges by embracing its benefits and using them to full advantage.

To this end, we envisage an environment where the use of information and communication technology is regarded as an integral part of our everyday practices and administration management. It aims to lead the school into new and innovative practices where appropriate. It acknowledges the potential of ICT to impact on and enhance learning outcomes for all pupils and the work habits of all staff in order to support the school’s vision.

It is important to be realistic as banning the Internet or modern technology does not work and often makes it less likely a problem will be reported. Informed education to help our users spot potential dangers is likely to be far more effective.

We recognise that going on-line can have potential difficulties and dangers for young people. We aim to ensure we equip all school users with the understanding and tools they need to be able to keep themselves safe (as well as anyone they are responsible for) when on-line and to be confident to report anything they might find upsetting or threatening, be it inside or outside school.

CEOP, the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre has been set up by the National Crime Agency to help children stay safe on-line.

Click the link below if you would like to report something you think puts others at risk or you feel uncomfortable about something happening to you.

If the problem is serious and you need help quickly, speak to the Police directly by calling

999

Internet Filtering

When using the Internet there is always the possibility of exposure to potential dangers or inappropriate content so, to help prevent this, Penn Fields has its own Internet content filter which is constantly updated and refined to create as safe a browsing environment as possible.

Effective content filtering in school does not protect young people when at home or visiting friends or relations so it is therefore important that parents and carers get involved too. A number of Internet service providers offer content filtering as part of your broadband subscription but filtering may not be switched on unless you request it. If your provider does not offer content filtering you can purchase software to filter inappropriate material on your computer at home.e-

e-Safety Links

You can find out more about e-Safety by following the links below which will all open a new window or tab so it will be easy to return to this page if you need to.