KCSIE 2024: Key safeguarding changes schools need to know

In an election year, perhaps it’s unsurprising that the statutory Keeping Children Safe in Education (KCSIE) 2024 guidance had only minor changes from the previous iteration.

With the outgoing education secretary focused on securing her seat, the amends to the document were mainly linguistic. While more significant changes look set to come in for 2025, for now, there are a small number of amends that school safeguarding leads should be aware of.

KCSIE 2024: Key changes

Here’s a breakdown of the updates:

• Where the 2023 document used the term ‘abuse and neglect’, the new edition expands this to include ‘exploitation’.
• The phrase ‘deliberately missing education’ had been replaced by ‘unexplainable and or/persistent absences from education’.
• Text has been added to clarify that schools remain responsible for the pupils they place in alternative provision.
• Additional text has been included to clarify that ‘indicators of abuse and neglect’ can include that young people ‘see, hear, or experience its effects’ when referring to domestic violence.
• Some additional changes have been made to bring the document in line with the multi-agency guidance, Working Together to Safeguard Children 2023.

What is KCSIE?

KCSIE is statutory guidance issued by the Department for Education (DfE) under Section 175 of the Education Act 2002.

The document sets out the legal duties schools must follow to “safeguard and promote the welfare of children and young people under the age of 18 in schools and colleges. Schools and colleges must ‘have regard’ to the document when carrying out their safeguarding duties”.

The document is updated annually to reflect changes in the safeguarding landscape and respond to the changing needs of young people.

• Why KCSIE is letting pupils and teachers down
• 5 tips for online filtering and monitoring
• How can schools stay ahead of emerging safeguarding threats?

Key changes made in 2023

In case you missed it, here are the three significant changes from KCSIE 2023:

• Schools must inform job applicants that online searches will be carried out.
• New instructions were given when it comes to online filtering and monitoring software used by schools.
• Details were given on how schools should handle any allegations made against an outside organisation or individual using school premises.

Big changes expected to come next year

While the 2024 edition of KCSIE only contains small updates to the 2023 version, the 2025 edition looks set to be significantly different.

Tes columnist Luke Ramsden explains that the DfE has been seeking feedback on KCSIE, with a view to producing a “substantively updated document, encompassing wider changes, to be delivered in 2025”.

Whether the new Labour government acts on any feedback and carries out these promised updates remains to be seen.

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