Your school's wellbeing journey starts with you going back to basics. 1. Create and implement a Wellbeing Policy. Your Wellbeing Policy provides a framework, which encourages and facilitates working practices to measure and improve staff wellbeing. It will provide clear guidance on your school’s commitment to staff wellbeing and ensures staff know how to access support. Your school has a duty to protect the health, safety and welfare of your employees and this policy outlines how you will support staff with their wellbeing and mental health in the workplace. For access to our Wellbeing Policy template please contact our helpful Wellbeing Advisors
2. Give staff a voice Giving your staff a voice, involves schools providing opportunities for individuals to openly communicate their views. Staff should have a direct influence on policies and matters that impact them at work. This includes their mental health and wellbeing. To successfully deliver sustained, measurable, positive change within your school you first need to understand the position you are starting from. For many schools there may be a gap between how you think you are supporting staff and the level of support staff perceive they receive. The key is to not make any assumptions. A staff survey can establish a baseline for your school that identifies a true and honest reflection of what your staff think about how they are supported in the workplace and will help you identify areas of development. For further information on our comprehensive Staff Survey please visit our services. 3. Create a Wellbeing Action Plan. The worst mistake we can all make is to ask for feedback and then do nothing with it. The feedback provided should be used to create your Wellbeing Action Plan. Your Wellbeing Action Plan can be a stand-alone plan or form part of an existing school development plan. A Wellbeing Action Plan should be a ‘living’ document that continually evolves based on the specific needs of your school and staff. The Action Plan sets measurable objectives based around your staffs’ physical, mental, social, and financial wellbeing. For access to our Wellbeing Action Plan template please contact our helpful Wellbeing Advisors
School Case Study
As part of our ongoing commitment to wellbeing, we asked one of our valued Kent-Teach customers, Thamesview School, to share their experience of establishing a Wellbeing Programme for their staff. Read our blog to find out how Thamesview has built a culture which prioritises staff wellbeing.