Education Business

St John’s is a co-educational preparatory day school situated on 28 acres of the green belt countryside in Potters Bar, Hertfordshire. With around 20 members of staff and over 200 students, aged between four and 11, it is imperative that safety and security are adequately addressed. Therefore, the decision was taken to demonstrate the school’s commitment to the safety and security by reviewing standards.
    
The answer? Secured Environments, a police approved accreditation for security developed by Perpetuity (an independent research company headed by Professor Martin Gill) and ACPO SBD (The Association of Chief Police Officers, Secured by Design). The accreditation follows six key principles developed through extensive research and consultation with industry experts from around the world.

What are the principles?

• Commitment to creating a secure environment. The senior leadership team must show high-level management commitment to creating a secure environment. Without this, no matter how much time or money is spent on security, it is unlikely to be fully effective.
• Understanding of the problem. A Secured Environments organisation proactively gathers and analyses information from a wide range of sources to develop an understanding of the crime and disorder risks it faces.
•  Develop a response. Security measures need to be in place, which are appropriate, targeted and proportionate to the risks identified.
• Manage the response. Security measures can be expensive and it is important to track these costs to enable effective budgeting. The management team needs to know what resources (e.g. people, time, money and technology) are used within the organisation to create a secure environment and ensure that this is managed properly according to project management principles.
•  Implement the solution. A Secured Environments organisation looks at the management and implementation of security measures and stresses that all staff must know their roles and responsibilities with regard to security. 
• Evaluate the solution. All security measures need to be monitored and evaluated to determine their effectiveness.
  

These principles are designed to incorporate the fundamental stages of good crime prevention, whilst remaining easy to follow for those with no prior experience of crime prevention. It seems that this approach has the desired effect with the Headteacher at Church Hill Primary School reporting that the principles were a useful starting point to enable them to evaluate where the schools strengths and weaknesses lay and providing a clearer idea of what they needed to achieve in relation to security.

Gaining ‘secured environments’ status
In order to assess St John’s validity to be accredited with the Secured Environments status, independent auditors from Perpetuity spent a day at the site, speaking with representatives from the senior management team, teachers, teaching support staff, administrators, and site security staff. It was crucial that all members of staff were involved in this process in order to gain a comprehensive picture of how policy is implemented. This also provided an opportunity to understand staff roles in relation to security, as commitment is needed from every member of staff in order to develop and maintain a truly secured environment.
    
Feedback was provided to St John’s within two weeks of the audit. This outlined the areas where the school was fully meeting the criteria, as well as highlighting areas of weakness. The feedback also provided suggestions on how the gaps could be addressed. The school responded to the areas for improvement promptly and was able to demonstrate that appropriate action had been taken to resolve the outstanding issues. St John’s Preparatory School then became the first private school to receive the Secured Environments Accreditation.

Secure yet homely
Speaking about the accreditation, Mrs Tardios, the school’s headmistress said: “As a small school in a semi-rural location we want to engender a familial feeling in everyone who comes here, be they parents, pupils or staff members. The Secured Environments procedures we have adopted allow us to be security conscious without choking out any of the old-fashioned homeliness we have also worked hard to cultivate.”
    
Secured Environments was a good choice for St John’s because it works very well for organisations with older buildings. The inability to change certain aspects of existing buildings limits security options, and buildings that are outdated or poorly designed can be difficult and/or expensive to retrofit. It is of little surprise therefore that a large number of schools and universities have signed up for the scheme, where re-designing older buildings is not economically feasible.
    
The St John’s Preparatory School is now fully accredited by Secured Environments demonstrating to their staff, students, parents, and prospective parents that safety and security within the school gates is taken seriously. Their Secured Environments Accreditation is valid for three years and can be extended through demonstrating ongoing high standards at the end of the period. This is a fantastic achievement and the good practice demonstrated by St. John’s provides a strong role model for other schools.
    
Any organisation that can display their commitment to the six principles in their security policies could be eligible to be awarded with the Secured Environments Status. Alan McInnes, (general manager, ACPO SBD, emphasises that “Police certification schemes like this give the public, customers and staff the confidence that security is being treated seriously by organisations who achieve certification.” Supported by the academic rigour of the audit process, this endorsement from ACPO SBD provides reassurance that the Secured Environments Scheme is a positive way forward in security accreditation.

The Perpetuity Group
Perpetuity is a leading provider of research, consultancy, training and conferences in the areas of crime reduction, community safety and security.
   
We provide bespoke services to international companies, central and local government, public service providers, private businesses as well as charities and voluntary organisations. We have established an international reputation for excellence by combining a scholarly approach with a broad range of practical experience.
   
Our collective commitment is to provide our clients with solutions that make a difference. Perpetuity engages in a range of research projects including extensive work around schools, teachers and young people; recent and ongoing work includes the development of a gang’s toolkit for schools, a survey of parent’s views of school security, and a survey of young peoples’ views and experiences of knife crime.

For more information
For more information on Secured Environments call one of the team on 0116 222 5555 or visit www.securedenvironments.com
    
Information on St John’s Preparatory School and St John’s Senior School can be found at: www.stjohnsseniorschool.org.uk/contactus.htm