Policies and Procedures

Janis Anderson School of Dancing

Policies & Procedures

Updated September 2024

Roles and Responsibilities for Teachers, Staff and Volunteers

Here at Janis Anderson School of Dancing we commit to the well-being of all students and members of our Dance Family. With the Roles and responsibilities stated below, we will, together ensure that everyone is kept as safe, well protected, respected within our School.

Our teachers will;

Plan Lessons and be prepared for our students classes.
Prepare students for ISTD Classical Ballet, Modern Theatre, Tap, Acrobatic arts and Lamda examinations
Encourage Students to participate in all lessons, add value and feel heard within their group.
We will continue to develop our skills within our research and training always developing ourselves, making our teaching current and relevant to our students today.
No discrimination of any sort.
Implement different teaching methods depending on, class size, teaching objectives, students dance knowledge, ability.
Keeping track on students performance in class and in performance. Continual assessments will take place to check which areas of our classes need attention and more development.
Provide 1:1 time in class for students who just need a little extra help with a task.
Always give feed back positively and constructively.
We will always endeavour to communicate effectively to our parents making sure everyone is aware of school details, news, up and coming events etc..
All equipment will be checked and cleaned regularly.
All licences and insurances up to date
We will always make it our duty to keep your child safety following Health and Safety and Safeguarding guidance
We will always be aware of who is first aider, safeguarding officer and fire regulations for each venue we teach at.
Students and staff will get to collaborate with many different genres over their time here at Janis Anderson School of Dancing. Working with our local communities on events, charity performances and take part in large national events too.
Guidance School holds our very own whole school charity performance every two years.
We hope to make each class fun, engaging and share our love for dance to all our students

Roles and Responsibilities For students

Janis Anderson School of Dancing strive to deliver the best learning experience we can, to all of our students. Below are the expectations of our students to keep everyone learning happily and safely together.

Always be on time for class, make sure you have all your belongings needed for the sessions.
Be ready to learn, this is so important. If you are ready, so are we, we can make dance magic happen!
Be respectful to all, including yourself
Set achievable goals and remember dance takes time and lots and lots of practice.

Roles and Responsibilities For Parents/Guardians

It is important to us that our Parents/Guardians have clear communication paths with Teachers at Janis Anderson School of Dancing and that we all play our parts to keep our school running as smoothly, as safe and respectful as we can. Below is some guidance of what we would like to ask our Janis Anderson School of Dancing families to commit to.

Please insure students are attending classes on time and they are ready for class (please make sure they have been to the toilet before class, especially our little dancers)
Remind students to have correct uniform and all belongings needed for class.
Pay all fees first week of term (please contact me if you need any different arrangements).
Advise if you are not receiving emails from the school and we will endeavour to rectify.
Let Janis Anderson School of Dancing know if there are any concerns or problems that may affect a students lesson.
Encourage your child to develop skills at home and practice outside class.
Have respect for teachers opinions and advice for students progressions.
Appreciate the expectations and abilities of once a week students and try not to set high expectations especially in exam time, we can not foresee how students will cope in this environment. But we know they will always do their best in good Janis Anderson School of Dancing style!
Always collect your child promptly at the end of class or let Janis Anderson School of Dancing know if there is a problem.

Safe Dance Practice

Janis Anderson School of Dancing takes our safe dance practice extremely important to keep our students safe and taught to the best of our abilities.

Our teachers are highly qualified and they will continue to develop themselves, through courses and workshops. This will keep their teaching current and therefore the outcome of making our students better dancers in the future.

Teachers will all have first aid training and have ice packs on hand and a first aid kit with them in every venue attended and correct ways to report accidents.

Staff and volunteers will always know who is the appointed first aider and there will always be one present in all venues.

They will have a risk assessment draw up and know the fire safety information for each venue.

We hope that we can accommodate and be inclusive in all our lessons and will work to make this happen for all students, meeting specific learning needs and putting in place reasonable adjustments if needed and where possible.

We will always strive to make dance accessible to all in a friendly, fun and safe way.

Safe Guarding Policy

Janis Anderson School of Dancing is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of all children/Adults and expects all staff, visitors and parents to share this commitment. It is every dance schools statutory responsibility to safeguard and promote the welfare of children, as outlined by the DFE in its publication Keeping Children Safe in Education.

This means that the dance school must protect children from maltreatment, prevent impairment of children’s health or development, ensure that children grow up in circumstances consistent with the provisions of safe and effective care and take action to enable all children to have the best outcomes in life.

Our safe guarding officer is Jennifer Tucker (Principal). We promote an ethos where children and parents feel comfortable sharing their concerns about their safety and well being of others.

Child protection is everybody’s responsibility and all people in the dance school community have a duty to act on any concern. If you are concerned about the safety of any child in our dance school, you must report this to the designated safeguarding leads - Jennie Donnachie. If you are concerned about the conduct of an instructor or a volunteer in our dance school, you must contact the Principal Jennifer Tucker.

Photographs must not be taken (or recordings made) whilst on site unless authorised by the dance school to do so.

Child protection policy

Ensuring a DBS (formerly CRB) check against all staff.
Raising awareness of child protection issues and equipping children with the skills needed to keep them safe.
Establishing a safe environment in which children can learn and develop.

The school will endeavour to.

Establish and maintain an environment where children feel secure, are encouraged to talk and are listened to.
Ensure children know that there are adults in the school whom they can approach if they are worried.

This policy applied to both children under 18 years and vulnerable adults. We have a duty of care to safeguard all children from harm whilst involved in tuition, practice and performance DURING THE TIME THEY ARE IN CLASS UNDER SUPERVISION.

Our Child Protection Policy is to follow good practice guidelines. These guidelines cover physical injury, sexual abuse, emotional abuse and staff are made aware of their responsibilities which include avoiding unnecessary physical contact and/or private or unobserved situations.

Inclusion, Equality and Diversity Policy

Janis Anderson school of dancing will follow the guidelines of the Equality Act 2010 at our dance school we will;

Welcome anybody into our school with no discrimination
Take a no bullying tolerated policy
Build relationships within our classes to have mutual respect with no discrimination
Work in an appropriate encouraging and sensitive manner where all students feel supported equally
Be aware of the protected characteristics and do not discriminate against any or these
Making sure all children are treating others how they would like to be treated ourselves
Planning lessons that are appropriate for all learners
Make sure all learning techniques are used to access all types of learners
All resources are accessible for all student
Make sure we act on any discrimination in class
Provide equal opportunities to all students and in our recruitment
Make provision for all students needs, this might be through reasonable adjustments
Make sure we encourage students/parents to discuss any equality, diversity or inclusion issue with their teacher so we can work together for the student best learning outcome.
Buildings and venues are all accessible
Take seriously any reports of harassment, discrimination or bullying.

Behaviour Policy

Standards of Behaviour expected:

All members of the dance school community are expected to: be responsible for their own actions and know how to behave. ▪ show self-discipline and support others.

▪ have good manners and be polite.

▪ show understanding and respect towards each other and others’ property.

▪ display positive attitudes to school and work which emphasises high standards.

Anti-bullying Policy

Janis Anderson School of Dancing we do not tolerate bullying of any kind and It is expected that parents will support us in encouraging their children to show respect and support our authority when disciplining its pupils. Any incident of apparent bullying is investigated.

Prevent Policy

At Janis Anderson School of Dancing we commit to The Prevent Strategy to support young and vulnerable people from being drawn into extremism.

We will set out to protect children and adults from Radicalisation by firstly recognising and responding correctly and directly to Cheshire West and Chester council Prevent team who will be able to deal with our concern.

GDPR Policy

Janis Anderson School of Dancing Data that is collected when a student enrols is stored and handled within the policy and procedure principles from the Data protection Act 2018. GDPR states that personal data should be ‘processed fairly & lawfully’ and ‘collected for specified, explicit and legitimate purposes’ and that individual’s data is not processed without their knowledge and are only processed with their ‘explicit’ consent. GDPR covers personal data relating to individuals. Janis Anderson School of Dancing is committed to protecting the rights and freedoms of individuals with respect to the processing of children’s, students, parents, visitors and staff personal data. The Data Protection Act gives individuals the right to know what information is held about them. It provides a framework to ensure that personal information is handled properly.

How we will hold your data and what we will do with it;

We will not disclose or sell personal data to third parties other than examination bodies.
We will not disclose any personal data to another members of Janis Anderson School of Dancing
We will use your contact number and email for communication through our website with details of up and coming events and general school information.
Contact and Emergency contact will be held on registers just in-case of an emergency.
Medical information will be held on registers in case of emergency
Personal data stored in a locked password protected database
Hard copies are locked away and destroyed via shredding when a student leaves the school

Online and Media Policy

Use of iPad's/Laptops in class for educational need only

When showing online content in class we will follow e-safety policy and;

make sure all laptops/iPads used have passwords
Make sure all laptop/iPads have only appropriate, age related content assessable.
Students are not left alone and only used in class under supervision.

No phones in class to try to limit internet access in class time unless we are using it for education need.

Always encourage safe internet practice to all members of the Janis Anderson school family.

Photos and Video Policy

Parents are asked to sign the enrolment form this will be a disclaimer for all parents/guardians/carers to give their permission for photographs and/or video recordings to be taken from time to time by school staff or appointed professionals for promotional material for the school and social media. If any parent/guardian/ carer objects to this, it is their responsibility to tick the correct box to ensure that the principal is made aware.

Health and Safety Policy

Janis Anderson School of Dancing aims to keep the working environment clean, tidy and free from hazards. We endeavour to conduct dance classes in a safe and proper manner, encouraging good warm-up and cool-down practices and supplementing the syllabus exercises by keeping abreast of the most up to date thinking in dance practices. First Aid - Janis Anderson School of Dancing will comply with the requirements of the Health and Safety. First aid boxes are carried with staff at all venues and checked on a monthly basis. All students/Parents must inform Janis Anderson School of Dancing of any Allergies, Disabilities, Injury that may prevent their dance practice. Appointed First Aider is Jennifer Tucker.

If students are going on a trip with Janis Anderson school of dancing a risk assessment will be drawn up with specific health and safety aspects of the trip. This will be communicated with the trips schedule to all Parents and guardians who are attending the trip.

Complaints Policy

If you wish to make a complaint for any reason to Janis Anderson School of Dancing please contact Jennifer Tucker (Principal) via email jennie@janisanderson.co.uk or telephone 07734853336 and we will communicate confidentially with your complain and try to resolve to the best of our ability.

Licenses and Insurances

Janis Anderson School of Dancing is covered for public liability and PPLPRS music License.

Recruitment Policy

Our policy will aims to ensure the best possible staff are recruited to Janis Anderson school of dancing.

We will follow the guideline from the link below

https://www.royalacademyofdance.org/app/uploads/2022/01/19155439/Recruitment-and-Selection-Policy_June2018_3_final_rb.pdf

Safe Recruitment in the UK ask for dance schools to adopt a fair and thorough process to recruit members of staff and volunteers.

At JADance school we take our recruitment processes seriously to make sure we get the best person for the job title.

Our jobs will be advertised on our website and other platforms available. They will have specific criteria as per the job description and application form, we will ask for these details below;

CV - detailed with personal details including any disabilities or need that we can assist with reasonable adjustment, past dance experience, employment history.
Referee details - Name, Telephone, email and reason for using them as referee
DBS Certificate Number (if you have one already in place) for due diligence checking
Qualifications - All qualifications held with which faculty and to which standard and grade achieved.
Personal Statement - tell us all about yourself
Suitability to role - tell us from your recent experience or something that relates to the job title and why you would be the best candidate for this position.
Dance teachers Insurance - all teachers must hold liability insurance.

Once we have shortlisted applicants we will have a interview process and a class observation task, will try to create a relaxed atmosphere to which the applicant can show us their best.

Making sure all applicants have the best possible chance by having as much information available.
We will advise and support with any questions or queries with regards to the whole process from application to employment.
Teaching Observations for the teacher to come and visit some of the classes to see the level of students are at, a brief discussion giving them some basic knowledge of studies abilities (if needed) and then ask them to arrange a class which would suit this age, standard, ability.
Give feedback and a chance to reflect on their lesson.
Encourage new teachers to meet the team and introduce them to the school and venues we teach in.
Show how we value our code of conduct and lead by its example.
Share with them some of our schools Ethos
Always encourage new staff to show off some skills to our students so they can be inspired by every teacher they experience.
Ask students opinions on new applicants this is a great way to gauge if the teacher will work well with our students.

Fees and Reductions

Janis Anderson School of Dancing will operate 12 Week term. Students fees must be paid for by the first week of term. For students who attend multiple classes will get a 10% discount over the sessions.

Class Cancellations or Re-scheduling

We try our very best to avoid cancelling class where possible but in the unfortunate event we do (i.e. pandemic, illness, unpredictable weather conditions) we will always do our best to continue the timetable as normal via the means of ZOOM classes, or re- schedule and add onto an extra term or deduct the cost from a new term.

Unfortunately we would be unable to offer refunds for any classes cancelled.

Zoom Classes

Should classes be moved online due to illness, unforeseen circumstances, global pandemic, government restrictions etc there will be no refunds, nor transference of fees to a new term.

Janis Anderson School of Dancing will continue to provide high quality dance training via the means of online classes.