Tips, Ideas, Guidance and Advice for School Leaders

Keeping Children Safe in Education 2026 comes into force on 1st September 2026, replacing KCSIE 2025. The guidance was published on 7th July 2026, which means most schools have had the summer to prepare rather than scrambling in the first week of term. If your policies, training and staff briefings are not yet aligned to it, here is where to focus before the gates open. Update the child protection policy first Your child protection and safeguarding policy needs to reflect KCSIE 2026, not the 2025 version, from day one of the autumn term. This is not a paperwork exercise to fit in when time allows. Every member of staff, including anyone joining in September, must have read and understood Part One before they are left alone with pupils, so the policy itself needs to be correct before that reading happens. A few changes are worth checking against your current wording specifically. Annex A has been withdrawn in the 2026 version, so any policy or training material that still signposts staff to it needs amending. Guidance on gender questioning children has been incorporated directly into the statutory text, with an expectation of parental involvement in most cases and a clear internal process for handling requests around social transition, including how records are kept. If your policy is silent on this or still points to separate non-statutory guidance, that is a gap to close now. Get safer recruitment right before anyone new starts Safer recruitment requirements have shifted this year. DBS checks are now required for volunteers, and the previous "supervision exemption" that allowed some volunteers to work without one has been removed. If you have volunteers lined up for September, whether that is reading helpers, sports coaches or governors who work directly with pupils, check now whether they fall under the new requirement. Schools with EYFS provision have an additional change to build in. Under the 2026 EYFS framework, an individual must not begin working or volunteering in that setting until both the barred list check and an enhanced DBS check have come back. This is a firmer line than previously applied, and it has direct implications for how quickly you can onboard EYFS staff and volunteers in the run-up to term starting. Build the extra time into your recruitment timeline now rather than discovering the gap when someone is due to start. Review filtering, monitoring and online safety before staff use the systems Online safety carries significant weight in this year's update, with new emphasis on filtering and monitoring, artificial intelligence, and where accountability for these systems sits. Before term starts, confirm who owns responsibility for filtering and monitoring in your school, when it was last tested, and whether that testing is properly recorded. Good practice now includes keeping a record of when checks were conducted, which devices and environments were tested, what issues were found, and what was done about them. If AI tools are in use anywhere in the school, whether in the classroom or in back-office systems, safeguarding oversight needs to extend to them explicitly rather than assuming existing policy already covers it. Brief your designated safeguarding lead role clearly The core DSL role has not changed in nature, but the volume of surrounding detail has, and this is the year to make sure the DSL and deputy DSLs have had proper time with the full document rather than a summary. Before the first INSET day, the DSL should be confident in the specific wording changes around early help, children's social care terminology, and any local safeguarding partnership arrangements that have moved since last year. A DSL who is still working from 2025 knowledge in a September safeguarding briefing risks passing that gap on to the whole staff body. Brief all staff properly, not just designated leads Every member of staff needs a safeguarding update that reflects KCSIE 2026 specifically, delivered before pupils arrive. This briefing should cover what has changed since last year in plain terms, not simply repeat last year's training with a new date on the slide. Staff need to know how to recognise and report a concern under the current guidance, what has changed around online safety and filtering, and where the updated referral routes and terminology sit locally. New staff need this alongside existing staff, not as a separate, lighter version delivered later. Bring governors into the picture Governing boards and trustees have oversight responsibility for safeguarding, and that oversight only works if governors understand what has actually changed. A short, plain-English briefing ahead of the first governance meeting of the year, covering the headline changes and what the school has done to prepare, keeps governors equipped to ask the right questions and to hold leaders to account on this properly. A final thought KCSIE 2026 is a substantial update, and no school will have every strand perfectly bedded in by the first day of term. What matters most in these final weeks is sequencing: policy correct first, safer recruitment and online safety checks second, then staff and governor briefings built on accurate foundations. Get those in the right order and September becomes a matter of delivering what is already prepared, rather than working it out as the term begins.

KCSIE 2026 changes what your September safeguarding INSET needs to cover. This guide helps DSLs plan training that's statutory, engaging and ready to deliver.

KCSIE 2026 brings wide-ranging changes that every DSL and school leader needs to understand before September. Read our summary of the key updates, including new guidance on emotional abuse, mental health, misogyny and AI, required for inset training.

The DfE has launched a consultation on proposed changes to Keeping Children Safe in Education, with the finalised KCSIE 2026 due to be published in September. The draft guidance covers significant updates across a range of areas, including new guidance on supporting pupils questioning their gender, the removal of the condensed Annex A, expanded mental health safeguarding, and changes to how schools should address AI-generated content and child-on-child abuse. Nothing changes yet, but now is the time to read the draft, share it with your team, and have your say before the 22nd April deadline.

The 2025 Keeping Children Safe in Education (KCSIE) updates you need to know, including FREE staff update PowerPoint.

An update to this blog can be found here. At the time of writing, the 2025 edition of Keeping Children Safe in Education hasn’t yet been published. Usually, schools can expect a draft version of KCSIE by late May. This gives DSLs and headteachers time to understand any changes, update policies and shape INSET content before September. That hasn’t happened this year and while there’s no official delay that we know of, the silence is noticeable. So what’s going on? What might be coming? And how can we prepare now without rewriting everything twice? Why hasn’t KCSIE 2025 been published yet? There’s been no formal explanation but here’s what we know: A 12-week government Call for Evidence on safeguarding practice closed in June 2024. Many expected it to inform a significant revision of KCSIE 2025, but the findings were never published. The 2024 General Election likely paused or reset several DfE timelines. It’s not yet clear how the new government intends to handle the previous consultation, or whether they’ll refocus on different priorities. Two major pieces of legislation — the Crime and Policing Bill and the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill — are still working through Parliament. Both contain measures that would affect KCSIE if passed. Rather than pushing out a draft too soon, the DfE may be waiting to align the guidance with legislative progress. Or we may see a short-term administrative update followed by a fuller revision later. At this point, it’s impossible to say. What changes might be coming? Here’s what’s been discussed or proposed over the past year, though none of it is confirmed at this point. 1. Mandatory reporting of child sexual abuse The Crime and Policing Bill includes a statutory duty for people working in regulated activity to report known or suspected sexual abuse. This would be a significant change in safeguarding culture and procedure and we’d expect KCSIE to reflect it across Parts 1, 2 and 4. If this becomes law, schools will need to review: ✓ how staff are trained to recognise and report concerns ✓ how leaders record, triage and act on those concerns ✓ how this new duty interacts with existing LADO and allegations procedures 2. Increased references to AI and digital safeguarding The same Bill also tackles emerging risks from AI-generated child abuse imagery and online exploitation. If included in KCSIE, it’s likely to appear in safeguarding risks, staff training content and the wider online safety curriculum. 3. Stronger multi-agency requirements and local oversight The Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill could bring in clearer expectations around: schools' roles in multi-agency safeguarding arrangements child protection teams and local decision-making registers of children not in school It also links to wider changes around data sharing, elective home education and early help — any of which may need reflecting in school policies or procedures. 4. Potential shift in the DSL role The 2024 Call for Evidence flagged concerns about the scale and complexity of the DSL role. While no concrete proposals have been shared, it’s possible that: the scope or structure of the role could change greater emphasis might be placed on shared safeguarding leadership workload, governance or training requirements may shift Again, nothing is certain but it’s a space to watch. What can we do now? Even without the final guidance, schools can take practical steps: Keep your INSET plans flexible — build time in early September for safeguarding updates, even if the details aren’t yet final Review your current policies — a light-touch audit now can save stress later Hold back on publishing new safeguarding documents until the confirmed KCSIE 2025 text is available If you’re a DSL, it’s not unreasonable to hold off on your full staff training pack but it is worth getting prepared. How Honeyguide will support you As soon as Keeping Children Safe in Education 2025 is released, we’ll move quickly to get everything you need in one place, including: A free KCSIE 2025 information briefing summary outlining what’s changed A full KCSIE 2025 Annual Safeguarding Refresher Training pack, containing everything you need to deliver full safeguarding refresher training during INSET A new full-year safeguarding pack with revised scenarios and termly content Clear, practical commentary so you know what matters and what’s noise We’ll also send out a bulletin to let you know the moment the new guidance lands — sign up here if you’re not already on the list. Final thought There’s no need to panic but there is a need to stay alert. Whenever the final KCSIE 2025 guidance appears, it’s likely to include some key updates that DSLs and school leaders will need to act on quickly. We’ll be here to help you do that with calm, practical tools and no waffle.  

A full INSET in September isn’t always enough. Explore how to keep safeguarding training active, staff confident and pupils safe all year round.

Discover how scenario-based safeguarding CPD builds staff confidence, not panic. Practical, quick activities to support real-world judgement and training.

The 2024 Keeping Children Safe in Education (KCSIE) draft has been released today. This quick summary shares all you need to know.