Parkgate Primary School will be working on achieving School of Sanctuary Award in the academic year 2020-2021.

Aim of the School of Sanctuary Award:

· Create a culture of welcome for everyone, especially refugees, asylum seekers and other sanctuary seekers.

· Promote the voices and celebrate the contributions to our society of people who have either sought or are seeking sanctuary.

· Build understanding of the experiences of displaced people and help combat stereotypes about refugees and asylum seekers.

What is a School of Sanctuary?

School of Sanctuary is an initiative that celebrates good practice of schools who foster a culture of welcome and inclusion for all, especially asylum seeking and refugee families. It is a school that demonstrates its commitment to creating a safe environment that benefits everybody, including anyone in its community who is seeking sanctuary.

It is a school that plays a crucial part in helping young people to make sense of the world and to understand what it means to be seeking sanctuary. It is a school that help young people to create positive changes in their communities and to become responsible citizens.

Why become a School of Sanctuary?

This process will provide the school with a valuable strategic tool for school improvement and enable us to meet a wide range of statuary and non-statuary obligations. This accreditation process will help us to demonstrate what we already do well or help us to meet or the following.

· The school’s obligation under the Equality Act 2010.

· Contribute to Social, Moral, Spiritual and Cultural Development and continue to build understanding of British Values.

· Provide learning opportunities around global issues, human rights, social justice, diversity and interdependence.

· Build a school culture that reduces intolerance, hate speech and bullying.

· Underpin work on building an inclusive and supportive school community.

· Increase pupil voice to become responsible citizens and promote active citizenship.

· Engage with families in the local community.

· Opportunities to network with other schools.

· Improve the provision of English as an additional language in school.

· Improve pupil outcomes and attendance.

· Provide evidence that meets the expectations of OFSTED.

The accreditation process will require the school to reflect on how it addresses the three process of Learn, Embed and Share to meet the minimum criteria.

· Learn: what is means to be seeking sanctuary.

· Embed: concepts of welcome, safety and inclusion in the school and the wider community.

· Share: vision and achievements.

What we will do?

The school will continue to deliver focused work on educating the whole school community about the human right to sanctuary through PSHCE and will continue to engage with sanctuary seekers and their families in the local community.

PSHCE lead will develop relevant work to be delivered specifically about refugees and asylum seekers to enable the children to understand.

Through pupil voice the school will encourage positive action to be taken by raising money for a local refugee charity.

Assistant Head teacher- Inclusion Manager - will create a portfolio of evidence of inclusive work that takes place in school and work alongside members of the school community.

Inclusion Manager will attend relevant training.

Inclusion Manager will keep all stake holders of the school informed of the process.

Inclusion Manager will continue to develop the school and strengthen identified areas of weakness.

Inclusion Manager will continue to establish processes that are sustainable and become embedded over time.

Inclusion Manager will seek relevant training and education opportunities for all staff on refugee, asylum and migration issues.

What is the value of this award for Parkgate?

This is an opportunity for Parkgate Primary School to showcase how inclusive the school is by successfully achieving this award. It is also an opportunity to demonstrate how valued the staff at Parkgate Primary School are and to have their work recognised through this process by achieving this award.