Network controls and monitoring tools
As part of their duty of care, services working with children and young people have a legal obligation to closely monitor access to their network and the Internet.
The Local Authority (L.A.) has now licensed Policy Central Enterprise (PCE) for all Northumberland schools.
In the interests of online safety, the L.A. and Northumberland Safeguarding Children’s Board will require that PCE be installed on all staff and pupil devices as part of the regulated provision of broadband services to schools.
N.B. If PCE is not implemented on all devices, the L.A. may restrict Internet access to schools.
Draft Guidance on the Use of PCE
Training and guidance on the use of PCE is available to all schools and clicking on this link will open draft guidance on the use of this software in schools.
We would welcome your feedback on the guidance, please respond to icthepscott@northumberland.gov.uk with your name, school and comments.
PCE offers a wide range of features to ensure the online safety of pupils and staff, in particular identifying and preventing:
- Bullying and threatening behaviour
- Abusive comments or offensive attitudes
- Inadvertent exposure to inappropriate web sites (pornography, violence, suicide)
- Deliberate access to inappropriate web sites
- Online gambling and shopping
- Un-moderated discussion forums and chat rooms.
Schools need a clear policy on how the information provided by PCE is to be used to control and manage access to the network and identify infringements in the school.
It is important that schools also identify the appropriate member of staff who has access to PCE to monitor and report on activity and how this information is to be shared with staff, senior management and governors.