The Harmful Sexual Behaviour Support Service created by SWGfL and the Marie Collins Foundation has provided invaluable support and guidance to the education sector since its launch in January this year, having helped hundreds of professionals across England.
The need for such a service became apparent after reports from Everyone’s Invited and the 2021 Ofsted Report 2021 highlighted an alarming rise in sexual harassment and abuse in schools, raising safeguarding concerns about the issue.
This was closely followed in September last year by the BBC Panorama documentary ‘Who’s Protecting The Kids?’ which looked at how reports of abuse in schools had risen over the previous four years. This included lived experience from teenage girls regarding abuse and assault by male peers.
With the safety and wellbeing of young people, especially girls, at risk of harm, SWGfL and the Marie Collins Foundation launched the Harmful Sexual Behaviour Support Service which was welcomed by education professionals as a new support avenue to tackle the issue of harmful sexual behaviour.
Since then, the service has provided guidance to professionals with advice on dealing with such behaviours, identifying gaps and understanding the impact of HSB on children and young people. The HSB team recognises that is not only important to respond to incidents where young people are committing any form of harmful sexual behaviour, but also to ensure the correct safeguarding measures are in place.
An Important Resource for Education Professionals
Since being implemented, all indications are that the HSB service has become an important resource for education professionals. This includes not only teachers, but also social workers and safeguarding boards, as well as other organisations involved in the safety and protection of children and young people.
HSB Support Service lead, Carmel Glassbrook said, “a lot of feedback we hear from professionals is that they are really grateful to have someone to talk to as they feel they have exhausted all the usual avenues and have not got any answers.
“The HSB service has been a great support to many professionals. All the research seems to indicate the problem of harmful sexual behaviours is not disappearing, and we need to continue to work to create environments where young people feel comfortable to make disclosures,” she said.
Some of the most common incidents reported by professionals seeking guidance from our HSB practitioners include:
- Students inappropriately touching others
- Young people exposing themselves to other children.
- Students using sexualised language offline and online.
The Harmful Sexual Behaviour Support Service is available to support anyone in England who works with children and young people in a primary school, secondary school, college, early years setting or work within a wider safeguarding area, such as police, social carers, or healthcare professionals.
If you are an education professional in England and need advice about a specific HSB incident, would like to be advised on correct policy and practice, would like to be signposted to appropriate resources or have any concerns call our HSB practitioners on 0344 2250623 or email hsbsupport@swgfl.org.uk
