Sector-Specific Screening Guide: Education - iltms.ssi.gov.sg

The Structured Decision Making? System

Sector-Specific Screening Guide: Education

July 2020

MINISTRY OF SOCIAL AND FAMILY DEVELOPMENT, SINGAPORE

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The Singapore Sector-Specific Screening Guides and Child Abuse Reporting Guide represent the contributions of many individuals, whose efforts to develop, review and refine the following decision trees and their definitions are greatly appreciated.

Practitioners and policy officers from the following ministries and non-governmental agencies contributed to tool development through their 2018 workgroup participation.

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Ang Mo Kio Family Service Centre

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Angsana Primary School

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Association for Persons with Special Needs, Chaoyang School

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Chatsworth Preschool

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CHIJ St. Theresa's Convent

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Christ Church Secondary School

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Early Childhood Development Agency

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Grace Orchard School

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Guidance Branch, Ministry of Education

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Macpherson Primary School

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My First Skool

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PCF Sparkletots Preschool

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YMCA Student Care Centre

MSF, Singapore is licensed to reproduce, install and display Structured Decision Making? materials within Singapore. Any modification or addition has to be approved by the US-based National Council on Crime and Delinquency (NCCD). NCCD will then grant a license to use such agreed-upon modifications or additions for internal purposes only.

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CONTENTS Purpose ........................................................................................................................................................................1 Sector-Specific Screening Guide Instructions ............................................................................................... 3 Cultural Notes............................................................................................................................................................6 Sector-Specific Screening Guide: Education..................................................................................................7 Definitions................................................................................................................................................................ 10 Glossary..................................................................................................................................................................... 28

The NCCD Children's Research Center is a nonprofit social research organization and a center of the National Council on Crime and Delinquency. Structured Decision Making? and SDM? are registered in the US Patent and Trademark Office.

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MINISTRY OF SOCIAL AND FAMILY DEVELOPMENT, SINGAPORE SECTOR-SPECIFIC SCREENING GUIDE: EDUCATION PURPOSE

The Sector-Specific Screening Guide is intended to assist reporters who are concerned about possible abuse or neglect of a child/young person (CYP) and must decide whether to report their concerns to the Ministry of Social and Family Development (MSF) Child Protective Service (CPS).

The reporting decision is not an easy one, and the consequences of the decision are considerable. Singapore has undertaken the effort to develop a multidisciplinary reporting guidance tool in order to achieve the following goals.

1.

Assist reporters as they gain familiarity with the reporting threshold.

2.

Help ensure that CYP and families requiring statutory child protective services

are promptly reported.

3.

Help increase direct family contact in response to reports by eliminating time

spent on reports that could be diverted for more appropriate service(s).

4.

Provide alternative options for reporters to assist CYP and families that would

be better served outside of the statutory child protection system.

This guide is intended to complement rather than replace critical thinking and does not prohibit a reporter from any course of action the reporter believes is appropriate. The guide incorporates design principles that help focus on the most critical pieces of information for the decision at hand. The guide reflects the consensus of multiple government departments and non-governmental agencies concerning situations that are best served through statutory responses and those that are best served through alternative interventions.

Finally, this guide is a dynamic document. Continuing evaluation and feedback will be used to refine this manual over time.

The decision process comprises two steps.

1.

The Sector-Specific Screening Guide (SSSG)

2.

The Child Abuse Reporting Guide (CARG; not included in this manual)

The SSSG is used by every professional who has contact with CYP. It is sector specific, providing each profession with an SSSG designed specifically to reflect the situations most likely to be encountered that may give rise to concerns about child abuse and neglect. The SSSG is designed to help sort concerns into those that should be further assessed for reporting consideration and those that require other action or no action at all.

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The CARG is used by trained specialists within each sector. It is used to guide the decision about whether to report, take alternative action or take no action. The CARG should be completed in consultation with the professional who had the concern whenever feasible.

In addition to reporting concerns to CPS, it is mandatory to report certain offences to the police. Under Singapore's Criminal Procedure Code, Section 424, persons aware of the action or intention of another person to commit certain arrestable offences have the duty to provide information to the police immediately.

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MINISTRY OF SOCIAL AND FAMILY DEVELOPMENT, SINGAPORE SECTOR-SPECIFIC SCREENING GUIDE INSTRUCTIONS

The SSSG is intended to complement rather than replace critical thinking and does not prohibit a reporter from any course of action the reporter believes is appropriate.

If you are concerned that a CYP known to you is being abused or neglected or is likely to be abused or neglected, this SSSG is a resource to help you decide whether concerns should be raised with the internal expert. If you contact your internal expert, the internal expert will discuss your concerns with you and use the CARG to help think through the decision of whether to report. Outcomes of this discussion may include:

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A decision to report, OR a decision that no report is needed OR a decision

that more information is needed before making the decision;

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Discussion of other resources that can be helpful for the family; or

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Discussion of possible ways to support the CYP or family whether or not a

report is made.

INSTRUCTIONS

1.

Select the general area that best fits the situation that concerns you (e.g. family

violence, physical injury).

2.

Using the definitions, select the specific item that best fits the situation that concerns

you. Based on the colour-coded location of the specific concern, the

recommendation for internal consultation is as follows.

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Red: Immediate consultation with internal expert. Matter to be brought to the

internal expert's attention as soon as possible and within two hours at the

most. Based on your individual working agreements, you may also report

directly to CPS.

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Yellow: Consultation with internal expert. Matter to be brought to the internal

expert's attention within 24 hours.

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Green: No consultation required. Maintain awareness for any change that

would escalate concern. Check in with CYP as appropriate.

3.

Initiate consultation if recommended.

Note: If the SSSG recommends consulting your internal expert, you should do so. If the SSSG recommends that consultation is not needed, you are not prohibited from consultation.

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PRACTICE GUIDANCE

If the concern is about harm to a CYP by an adult who is not part of the CYP's household, or by another CYP regardless of whether the other CYP is part of the household, do the following.

? Report to police if the matter may be a crime. ? If the CYP's parent/carer has not been protective, consider consulting with the internal expert

about whether the parent/carer is providing enough supervision. ? If the CYP's parent/carer has not obtained necessary medical or mental health care for a child

victim, consider consulting with the internal expert about whether the parent/carer is providing needed medical or mental health intervention for the CYP. ? If another CYP is causing harm, review whether the behaviour may be a response to previous harm caused to that CYP and whether that CYP is a danger to self or others.

WHAT TO DO IF INTERNAL EXPERT IS NOT AVAILABLE? For preschools, the following applies.

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Report all incidents to school principal.

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If school principal is not available, report to covering principal.

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Consult Early Childhood Development Agency (ECDA), the CARG expert, if

needed.

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Consult CPSCs or PAVE Integrated Services for Individual and Family

Protection Specialist Center (ISIFPSC) if needed.

If preschool staff need to contact or consult ECDA regarding suspected child abuse cases, they may contact their respective Regulation Officer. Regulation Officers are trained in CARG. Alternatively, they may write in to the general email address at contact@.sg, or call the hotline at 6735 9213.

For Ministry of Education (MOE) schools (special education and mainstream schools), the following apply.

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All incidents to be reported to school counsellor/student welfare officer,

(relevant staff as indicated in the school's standard operating procedures for

incident reporting) who will report to the school principal.

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If principal is unavailable, report to vice principal.

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Consult lead school counsellor if needed. (This does not apply to special

education schools as they do not have such positions in the schools.)

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Consult CPSCs or PAVE Integrated Services for Individual and Family

Protection Specialist Center (ISIFPSC) if needed.

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Contact with CPSC or ISIFPSC may be by phone or email.

HEART@Fei Yue (Operated by Fei Yue Community Services) Helpline: 6819 9170 Email: heartadmin@ Website:

Big Love (Operated by Montfort Care) Helpline: 6445 0400 Email: contact@.sg Website:

PAVE Integrated Services for Individual and Family Protection Specialist Centre (ISIFPSC) Helpline: 6555 0390 Email: intake@.sg Website:

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