In child safe organisations, setting clear expectations for staff about their role and responsibilities in championing children’s safety and wellbeing begins well before their first day.

The NSW Child Safe Standards emphasise the critical importance of embedding child safe principles into all aspects of an organisation, including policy, practice and culture. All early childhood education and care (ECEC) services in NSW have a legal obligation to implement the Child Safe Standards under the NSW Child Safe Scheme.

Standards 5 and 7 require all child-related organisations to ensure their staff have the appropriate skills, knowledge and continuous support to protect children from harm and abuse. This is an ongoing process that must start with recruitment and continue through onboarding, induction and beyond.

It demonstrates to potential, new and ongoing staff that an organisation has a child-focused culture, zero tolerance for child abuse and is committed to continuously improving its child safe capabilities.

Establish child safety expectations early

Embedding child safe principles into your onboarding and induction program reinforces a service’s commitment to children’s safety and wellbeing and establishes clear expectations for new staff on acceptable and unacceptable behaviours. It also equips staff with the knowledge and tools they need to perform their child safety duties capably, confidently and in compliance with all operational and legislative requirements.

The onboarding and induction process also provides service leaders with an opportunity to observe whether new staff uphold and prioritise the same child safe values as the service. This can help service leaders to further evaluate the suitability of new staff and additional training or support they might need before they start working with children.

In addition to information and documents that are typically provided during onboarding and induction, services should also, at a minimum, include:

• copies of the service’s child safe policies and procedures
• your service’s Code of Conduct and Statement of Commitment to Child Safety, outlining behavioural expectations for your staff and organisation
• information about child safety requirements under the National Quality Framework and other legislation, including reporting and record keeping obligations
• an overview of how child safety is embedded into daily practice, including any role-specific responsibilities
• child safety training, including mentoring programs and external training
• information on how service leaders will support staff to continuously improve their child safety capabilities.

Understanding child protection law and requirements

Under regulation 84 of the Education and Care Services National Regulations (National Regulations), approved providers are responsible for ensuring staff are aware of and understand their obligations under current child protection law.

All staff joining your service – whether they are an experienced educator or someone newer to the profession – should receive comprehensive induction training on their legal obligations relating to child safety. This includes mandatory reporting, record keeping and child protection training requirements under the following legislation:

• Children (Education and Care Services) Law (NSW) and National Regulations
• Crimes Act 1900
• Children and Young Persons (Care and Protection) Act 1998
• Children’s Guardian Act 2019.

Having a thorough understanding of child protection legislation reinforces for staff the seriousness of their role and responsibilities in protecting children from harm and actions they must take. It also highlights the critical importance of following service policies and procedures, which are developed to minimise risks and harm to children.

Your induction program should also provide best practice guidance for child safety, including how to recognise signs of abuse and neglect, identify grooming behaviours and respond effectively to allegations or incidents of abuse.

Introducing service policies and procedures

During onboarding and induction, it is important for staff to be made aware of and supported to understand any policies, procedures and guidelines that guide practice at your service.

You should provide copies of all service policies, procedures and child safe documents in your onboarding pack, including your:

• Providing a child safe environment policy and procedure (regulation 168(2)(h))
• Code of Conduct (regulation 168(2)(i)(i)), which should clear detail child safe expectations
• Statement of Commitment to Child Safety
• Child Safe Risk Management Plan
• information about your service’s child safety practices.

Visit the OCG website to access resources to help you create or identify gaps in your child safety documents. Resources include a child safe policy sample template pack and a guide to developing a child safe code of conduct.

Reading service policies and procedures is only one step in the process. Approved providers and service leaders should also provide comprehensive training to help new starters fully understand and correctly implement policies and procedures, including those focusing on providing a child safe environment (PDF 218 KB) and dealing with complaints (PDF 229 KB). This could be through knowledge checks, video tutorials or webinars, or reflective conversations with service leaders.

Role-play experiences are also a useful training tool, as they give new staff an opportunity to ‘practise’ implementing policies and procedures.

Running through scenarios to unpack adequate supervision, interactions with children and reporting requirements and practices allows service leaders to share feedback with new staff so they can confidently and correctly implement policies and procedures once they start working directly with children.

Best practice record keeping

Effective record-keeping practices support child protection and are an essential part of the induction and onboarding process.

Good record keeping helps to keep track of staff records, and ensure approved providers, services and staff are complying with regulatory requirements. This includes keeping accurate records of Working with Children Check (WWCC) clearances, staff qualifications, and child protection awareness and training.

Practising effective record keeping also promotes transparency and accountability, which are central to maintaining a child safe culture.

Approved providers and services must comply with all record-keeping requirements under the National Quality Framework. Read ACECQA’s best practice record keeping information sheet (PDF 133 KB) to identify how you can improve processes at your service.

Maintaining currency

It is important to offer regular induction refreshers and ongoing learning opportunities for your team, so they can remain up to date on best practices and emerging risks and continually build their child safe capabilities.

Consider offering a variety of learning experiences – including in-person workshops, e-learnings, webinars, 1:1 discussions and mentoring – to accommodate the learning styles of all staff members. Engaging in reflective practice, either as a group or through self-reflection, also encourages staff to identify opportunities for improvement.

Our Implementing the Child Safe Standards suite of resources, which has been developed by the OCG, can be used for inductions and ongoing training. The free resources are designed for approved providers, service leaders and educators within all ECEC service types. The OCG also offers a wide range of self-directed and tailored training and learning resources.

Services leaders should also seek feedback from new staff at the end of their induction to identify improvements that can be made to the onboarding and induction process and how child safety can be more deeply embedded in the program to support future staff.

Reflective questions

• How often does your service provide induction refreshers and ongoing training for staff?
• How can you improve your offerings of training and professional learning for staff? Are there options to suit the learning styles and preferences of all staff at your service?
• How can your service better support staff to feel confident in carrying out their roles and responsibilities around child protection?
• How can your service better embed the Child Safe Standards in your onboarding and induction?
• If a serious incident occurs, do you ensure that you reflect on the causes and offer training to staff to ensure the issue doesn’t occur again?