Breaking the Cycle: A New Way to Learn Safeguarding

Safeguarding is essential – and now simpler. In this blog, discover our new Learning Link module with flexible pathways and the latest updates and why it matters.

Blog

12/09/2025

In the cycle of education, things can often start to feel repetitive: summer comes to an end and the new school year begins, leaves begin to fall and Learning Link has its annual influx of users completing the updated Safeguarding module.

This year, however, Learning Link is excited to be doing things a little differently. With the hope that it will make your governance lives a little less repetitive, we have released a brand new Safeguarding module: the first ever built completely in-house at NGA.

When designing this module, the Learning Link team and NGA’s amazing subject matter experts sat down for a discussion about how to make our safeguarding module as easy as possible to repeat while still covering everything you need to know. At the core of this discussion are two competing facts: safeguarding is of vital importance, but governors and trustees have limited time to engage with e-learning.

Keeping these two competing truths in mind, we designed a process that features two pathways – the first, a full module that takes 1.5-2 hours to complete, and covers the fundamentals of safeguarding. This is for those new to governance or those needing to completely review their knowledge.

The second is a shorter pathway that tests your knowledge to ensure you know these fundamentals, before taking you directly to this years’ updates; this should take you between 30 minutes to an hour and is perfect for those looking to refresh their knowledge.

It is our hope that this means users can remain up to date without having to take the entire module annually, saving time while making sure everyone has the knowledge they need.

This year, updates to Keeping Children Safe in Education (KCSIE) highlight that this aims to prevent delayed referrals that can lead to missed opportunities to protect at-risk children and reflects the government's increased focus on attendance as a strategic priority.

Another focus of updates this year is the ever-expanding realities of cyber security threats. The updated guidance now explicitly requires schools to comply with the Department for Education's (DfE) cyber security standards – a critical change as schools are increasingly targeted by cyber-attacks.

Learning Link has recently partnered with Secure Schools to bring you a module on Cyber Security and Governance, helping you to ensure you are aware of the risks and your setting is compliant.

Alongside cybersecurity sits the increasing use of Artificial Intelligence – an area that presents both opportunities and threats – and so the "four Cs of online safety"- Content, Contact, Conduct, and Commerce – have been updated to include AI output, such as deepfakes, fake profiles, and aggressive targeted advertising.

From here on, the safeguarding cycle continues: each year we will fold the last year’s updates into the main module and replace them with that year’s updates for the refresher pathway. Hopefully, this will save you some time, but keep you aware of emerging threats and priorities, doing the most important thing: keeping the children in our schools safe.

We can’t wait to start receiving user feedback – bad and good all help us to improve your experience of Learning Link, so complete the module and let us know your thoughts on this new system – does it work for you?