Prevent duty guidance – How the latest updates affect your school
Mubina Asaria outlines the latest updates and changes to the Prevent duty that school staff need to be mindful of
The world has changed significantly since the government introduced Prevent duty guidance in 2015.
There’s been a pandemic. Young people are spending more of their lives online than ever. There are new and growing risks from the spread of fake news, emerging ideologies and conspiracy theories. These all add up to a very different risk and threat landscape.
However, my message to designated safeguarding leads and leadership teams would be, ‘don’t panic’.
Updated and refreshed
The first thing to note is that the latest guidance places no new legal requirements or additional responsibilities on education settings. Rather, the government has updated and refreshed it so that it promotes current best practice.
The Prevent duty guidance continues to focus on tackling the ideological causes of terrorism. In recent years, we’ve seen Islamist ideology remain resilient, while extreme right-wing ideologies have undergone a resurgence.
Other ideologies, while still a factor, have comparatively less potential to motivate, inspire and be used to justify acts of terrorism.
We’ve also seen how conspiracy theories can act as gateways into radicalised thinking and sometimes violence. This means it’s crucial that DSLs are aware of what these ideologies and how they are propagated.
The Prevent duty guidance underlines the need to embed age-appropriate online safety within the curriculum and develop young people’s ability to think critically.
This equips them with skills that will enable them to challenge, ask questions and check their sources, so that they don’t simply believe everything they see on their screens.
‘Susceptible’, not ‘vulnerable’
Some language in the guidance has been changed to reflect current best practice and updates to official terminology.
Instead of referring to individuals being ‘vulnerable’ to radicalization, the new term ‘susceptibility’ implies that individuals retain full agency, should they choose to adopt a terrorist ideology.
That said, the government readily acknowledges that minors are inherently more vulnerable to radicalisation, due to their age.
The latest guidance therefore includes a glossary of terms. These may be helpful for schools wanting to better understand the language around online radicalisation that adolescents are likely to use.
In the wake of the government’s 2023 counter-terrorism strategy, the ‘Risk and threat landscape’ section of the guidance has been fully updated.
Schools should carefully consider whether their most recent risk assessments accurately reflect and account for these changes.
Local and proportionate
There is also now a greater emphasis on local context. Decision making should be informed by the broader terrorism threat picture. This is so that any Prevent activity is proportionate to the size of the setting and local provision.
The risk picture for a school in Ealing, for instance, will be markedly different from that of a school in Wales.
You can find out more about your local risk and threat picture – sometimes referred to as a counter-terrorism local profile, or CTLP – by engaging with your local authority or local policing body.
The DfE’s Regional Prevent Education Coordinators (RPECs) can help to identify relevant partners in your locality and advise on how to contact them.
To support this, the DfE has produced a series of new Prevent risk assessment templates that can help schools better understand the national and local risk, and the response they should deploy.
Stay up-to-date
The guidelines’ authors have also provided greater clarity with respect to staff training requirements. I’d recommend that schools complete the government’s online Prevent duty guidance training for all staff.
Thereafter, DSLs and leadership staff will need to refresh their Prevent training every two years, enabling them to regularly update their staff and wider school community on relevant issues.
Finally, there’s a new national referral form for all Prevent partners. Schools should continue to follow their existing information sharing protocols. However, it’s critical that you securely transfer any Prevent concerns when a student moves school.
Mubina Asaria is a safeguarding consultant at LGfL – The National Grid for Learning. For more details about the organisation’s free interactive curriculum resources for students and staff training materials, visit prevent.lgfl.net
