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Bruce Castle Museum is taking part in The Museums and Schools Partnership Programme (PDF, 1.11MB), a DfE funded, Arts Council England project.

As part of the project, we are able to offer participating schools the opportunity to book extended sessions at the museum for no additional cost.

Options for extending your visit include:

• Exploring the building through our new Mystery Manor sticker activity booklets
• Taking part in a taught art and craft activity
• Visiting our new schools exhibition Wraparound: African and Caribbean cloths, head-wraps and symbolism. This exhibition has been designed specifically for local primary schools and has links to black history and art and design. It will run for 6 months from mid-September and we will be running weaving and adinkra printing workshops alongside it.

If your school would like to take part in an extended session, please contact 020 8808 8772 or email museum.services@haringey.gov.uk.

Please note, places on the Museums and Schools Partnership Programme are subject to availability.

More information can also be found on the website at the Bruce Castle Museum website (external link).

Watch koi carp as you wander under giant ferns by cascading water….

Handle adult and baby cornsnakes and giant hissing cockroaches!

All, at the Wolves Lane Centre – see the information flyer here (PDF, 453KB) .

Find out about more about the am or pm education sessions and ring the education officer at Wolves Lane or email  angela.appleby@haringey.gov.uk

For bookings, please go to the Traded Services wbesite (external link).

The council receives regular alerts from the police and national fraud agencies relating to organised fraud. There has been a recent fraud alert which the police say has been specifically targeted to schools in relation to telephone services. Please check your systems and follow the guidelines below. If you have any concerns, please contact the council’s Fraud Team.

Telephone PBX fraud
Private Branch Exchange (PBX) is a telephone switching system that connects internal telephones, as well as connecting them to the Public Telephone Network, and Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) providers. The PBX will often allow access to voice messaging systems. PBX fraud occurs when hackers target these systems from the outside and use them to make a high volume of calls to premium rate, or overseas numbers, to generate a financial return for themselves.

How does it work?
Depending on the type of system used there are a number of ways a hacker may gain access to a PBX system including: Incorrectly configured firewalls and set ups, poor security settings, lack of maintenance as well as the use of default/easy passwords.

Once access is gained, the criminals can exploit services such as voicemail, call forwarding and call diversion to direct calls to a number of their choosing. This will often be to premium rate or international numbers.

In this fraud, the criminal tends to make their money in two ways:

• Dialling premium rate numbers that are associated with international calling companies.
• Dialling international numbers through the compromised telephone system, most noticeably to Eastern Europe, Cuba and Africa.

This type of fraud is most likely to occur when organisations are most vulnerable i.e. during times when businesses are closed but their telephone systems are NOT, for example in the early hours of the morning or over a weekend or holiday.

How can schools protect against PBX fraud? 

• If you still have your voicemail on a default PIN/password change it immediately.
• Use strong PIN/passwords for your voicemail system, ensuring they are changed regularly.
• Disable access to your voicemail system from outside lines. This is usually used for remote workers to access. If this is not business critical then disable it or ensure the access is restricted to essential users and they regularly update their PIN/passwords.
• If you do not need to call international numbers/premium rate numbers, ask your telecoms provider to place a restriction on your telephone line.
• Consider asking your network provider to not permit outbound calls at certain times e.g. when your business is closed.
• Ask your telecoms provider to alert you immediately if there is any unusual call activity taking place on your telephone lines.
• Ensure you regularly review available call logging and call reporting options, regularly monitor for increased or suspect call traffic.
• Secure your exchange and communications system, use a strong PBX firewall and if you don’t need the function, close it down.
• If you use a maintenance provider speak to them or ensure that the person responsible for the PBX understands the threats and ask them to correct any identified security defects.

The council has developed a new 10 year strategy that sets out our ambitions for addressing and preventing violence against women and girls in Haringey.

The consultation for the strategy runs from 1st August 2016 to 26th September 2016 and we would like to hear your thoughts on our proposals. We value your views and we want you to help us to develop out priorities so that they make a real and sustainable different to the safety and wellbeing of Haringey residents. Feedback from the consultation will help us to develop a plan to implement the strategy.

We want to encourage you to take part by reading the strategy and responding to the questions set out in the consultation (external link) chapter at the end.

Alternatively, if you would like us to hold a focus group for you to feed into the strategy, please contact the Violence Against Women and Girls Coordinator, Shabana Kausar at shabana.kausar@haringey.gov.uk .

Primary school teachers can apply for free tree packs from Defra and the Woodland Trust.

Schools that don’t have space to plant on their grounds can work with the Woodland Trust and local authorities to plant on public land. These free trees enhance the local community and environment and also help schools to deliver the science curriculum.

The deadline for applications is 9 January to receive trees for planting in March.

For more information, visit the Woodland Trust website (exetrnal link).

Over the last week, nearly 300 residents have been nominated as Haringey Heroes, including staff and pupils from; Alexandra Park School, Woodside High, Lordship Lane Primary School, Tetherdown School, Risley Avenue Primary School, Parkview School, Alexandra Park School, North Harringay Primary School, Tiverton Primary School, Highgate Wood School, The Willow and The Brook school, Hornsey School for Girls, Haringey Sixth Form College, Northumberland Park Community School and Park View school.

Our Haringey Heroes range from the winner of the National Dressage Disability Championships and Middlesex Athletics Championships, the incredible work of student peer mentor groups across the borough, and the commitment and dedication shown by teachers and schools staff. Thank you for your nominations!

All of our Haringey Heroes stories (external link) are available online and show the incredible things that happen in our borough everyday and the unity and diversity that makes Haringey such a great place to live and work.

If you would like to nominate an individual or group of people as Haringey Heroes:

• Email us details (with photos if you have them)
• Or complete a simple form (external link)

Public Health Haringey would like to draw your attention to a new service we are delighted to offer to Haringey schools. Workforce wellbeing underpins engagement and when combined with effective leadership the power is immense. Wellbeing is central to developing individual and team engagement and commitment, unleashing optimum performance and sustaining innovation and organisational development. Our workforce wellbeing service offer builds on some very successful work to promote health and wellbeing within the council’s workforce.

Looking after and developing staff can contribute directly to young people’s development and learning. It also will help staff act as great role models for the young people in your school.

We have long recognised the importance of wellbeing in the workplace and was one of the pilot authorities involved in the London Healthy Workplace Charter when it commenced in 2012. We base our support on what we have learned firsthand, using national standards developed by Public Health England. Public Health Haringey offers a package of support to help schools become safer, healthier places. 

Included in this package are:

• Schools Wellbeing for staff
• Healthy Schools Programme
• Schools Health & Safety Service

Schools can buy these services individually, or all three together!

Please see the Public Health Schools SLA – Combined Offer (PDF, 484KB) and Workforce Wellbeing – Further Information Brochure 2016-2017 (PDF, 275KB), where you’ll find all the information you need, plus contact details for each member of our team leading on each of the offers within the package. 

Put staff wellbeing on your school staff meetings agenda now and we will support staff to keep healthy and well in the workplace!

Monday 27 June saw 2000 of Haringey’s young students perform in the world class Royal Albert Hall in Kensington. Two performances were held on the day, one at 3pm and the other at 7pm.

Performances included, highlights from Jurassic Park, compositions by Mos Def and Haringey’s very own James Redwood, Kate Stilitz and Jilly Harman.

Peter Desmond, Head of Music and Performing Arts Haringey said

This was a celebration of diversity and unity through the power of music. 95 young musicians from Haringey travelled to Peru in August 2015 for an intense series of music workshops and public concerts organised in partnership with Markham College, Lima. We were especially pleased to welcome the group from Markham College and Orquestando to perform with us.

Haringey Cabinet Member for Customer Services and Culture, Councillor Bernice Vanier said,

It’s fantastic that thousands of Haringey children performed at one of the most prestigious music venues in the world. The creativity, passion and diversity on display at the Haringey Schools’ Music Festival made the evening an amazing celebration of our young people.

The government’s Requirements for School Food Regulations 2014, which came into force in January 2015, require that schools must provide milk at least once during the school day. The School and Nursery Milk Alliance is keen to ensure that as many children as possible benefit from milk in school, and so has compiled advice for school governors on complying with the standards, as well as background to the legislation itself.

A school’s governing body is responsible for ensuring compliance with the standards, according to the Department for Education’s guidance, School food in England: Departmental advice for governing bodies (2015).

For more information about the School and Nursery Milk Alliance, please contact snma@snma.org.uk or call 020 7089 2607. You can also visit the SNMA website (external link).

The DfE has updated this statutory guidance which will apply from 5 September 2016. Whilst there are no major changes to policy, the guidance does provide further clarity and emphasis in certain areas. The key changes relevant to governing boards include:

• A clearer expectation for governing boards to have a nominated governor who is responsible for the school’s safeguarding arrangements (this does not absolve the rest of the governing board of responsibility for safeguarding and you should ensure that regular reports are received and discussed by the governing board about safeguarding);
• Ensuring the safeguarding and child protection policies account for peer-on-peer abuse, additional safeguarding challenges for children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND), and honour-based violence;
• Providing opportunities for staff to contribute to the development of such policies based on their safeguarding experiences;
• The fact that the Designated Safeguarding Lead (DSL) must be a member of the senior leadership team and cannot delegate this responsibility;
• Ensuring (rather than considering how) safeguarding is taught as part of a broad and balanced curriculum;
• Checking for section 128 directions (these will be flagged in a DBS check) which prohibit or restrict a person from taking part in the management of an independent school (including academies and free schools) including in a management position as an employee, as a trustee, as a member or local governor;
• Inclusion of the requirement for maintained school governors to provide enhanced DBS certificates.

In the light of this new guidance, Governors Services have updated their Safeguarding Governor Role Profile. Please contact Brenda Bruno for a copy. Also, in Haringey, there is now a Designated Leads Forum and your governing body may want to ensure their lead is engaging with your governor responsible for safeguarding.