Sunbury College- Child Safety
Dear Parents and Carers,
As we start the 2024 school year, I wanted to make sure that everyone in our community is aware of our school's child safety policies and procedures.
Child safety is fundamental to everything we do at Sunbury College. Some of you may have seen news articles about the Victorian government's Board of Inquiry into historical sexual abuse at Beaumaris Primary School and other Government schools, which heard evidence from victim-survivors of abuse from many decades ago. We have been reflecting on the inquiry and how we can ensure that our community feels safe to come forward at any time if they have anything to report.
As a College, we have no tolerance for child abuse of any kind and we take matters regarding child sexual abuse very seriously. Our whole school community is important to us no matter when students attended or left the school. We want to ensure that our current and former students are aware of reporting and support pathways and are confident that any concerns would be dealt with in a supportive manner. There is more information available on the Department’s website including contact details for reporting abuse: Report abuse if you’re a current or former student | vic.gov.au (www.vic.gov.au).
Every child should feel safe at school. Information about our College’s current child safety policies is available on our website Policies & Reports - Sunbury College (sunburysc.vic.edu.au) – (https://www.sunburysc.vic.edu.au/college/policies-reports/). We invite feedback on our policies and practices at any time – please contact me or an Assistant Principal.
Of course, if at any time any members of the community need any support in relation to child safety or other issues, you can always contact me, an Assistant Principal, or the Student Wellbeing Leader – I’ve also provided some community support resource details below.
Yours sincerely,
Craig O’Bree
Principal
Community support resources:
Kids Helpline: 1800 551 800 or kidshelp.com.au
Free, private and confidential telephone and online counselling service specifically for young people aged between 5 and 25 in Australia.
Headspace: 1800 650 890 or headspace.org.au
Mental Health and Wellbeing support for young people aged 12 to 25 years old.
Sexual Assault Crisis Line: 1800 806 292 or sacl.com.au
SACL is a state-wide, after-hours, confidential telephone crisis counselling service for people who have experienced both past and recent sexual assault. SACL operates between 5pm weeknights through to 9am the next day and throughout weekends and public holidays. During business hours, calls to SACL are diverted to a local Centre Against Sexual Assault.
Parentline: 13 22 89
Parentline is a state-wide telephone counselling and support service for all Victorian parents and carers of children from 0 to 18 years old.
13 Yarn: 13 92 76
The first national crisis support line for mob who are feeling overwhelmed or having difficulty
coping. They offer a confidential one-on-one yarning opportunity with a Lifeline-trained Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Crisis Supporter.
Lifeline
Anyone across Australia experiencing a personal crisis or thinking about suicide can call 13 11 14, or
text 0477 13 11 14 at night (6pm-midnight AEDT).