Rishton Methodist Primary School is participating in the Operation Encompass partnership scheme, between local schools, academies, colleges, community health agencies, and Lancashire Police.                                 

Operation Encompass was set up to provide early reporting to schools about any domestic abuse incidents that occur outside of school hours, to which a young person attending our school has been exposed, and which might then have an impact on their schooling the following day. This information will be shared throughout the year, including school holidays and the weekends.   

Operation Encompass was first introduced in Plymouth in February 2011, and has proved very effective in providing appropriate and timely support to young people affected by domestic abuse. This initiative has been implemented across the whole of the Lancashire Police area.  If you would like some more information about it, you can view it online at www.operationencompass.org.   

Information will only be shared with the school by the police where it is identified that a young person was present, witnessed or was involved in a domestic abuse incident.   

At Rishton Methodist, Mrs Higgens, our DSL, is our Operation Encompass Lead, along with Mr Steele and Mrs Newsham. They will be able to use information that has been shared with them, in confidence, to ensure that the school is able to make provision for possible difficulties experienced by children or their families. These Key Adults will keep this information confidential and will only share it on a need-to-know basis. For instance, with teaching staff for a child or young person.   

All police forces are fully implementing Operation Encompass using the key guiding principles:

• The sharing of information is between police and all schools in their force area. 
• All domestic abuse incidents will be shared where there is a child related to either adult involved, whether that be a crime or non-crime incident and irrespective of the risk assessment level.
•  Domestic abuse incidents in children’s own relationships will also be shared, as will child to parent abuse
•  The sharing of information must occur prior to the start of the next school day so that school staff have the opportunity to prepare for the child before they arrive at the school site and to ensure that from the very first interaction, the child experiences a positive and understanding response from school staff.
•  The context of the incident is also shared so that professionals can appropriately support and safeguard the child.

Updated October 2024