Certificate in Understanding Child Criminal and Sexual Exploitation (2021-22)

Course Duration: 205 minutes (approx.)

All staff should consider whether children are at risk of abuse or exploitation in situations outside of their families. They should be aware that safeguarding incidents and/or behaviours can be associated with factors outside of the school or college, including criminal exploitation and sexual exploitation.

This Essential CPD course provides you with the core content you need to ensure you are complying with your legal responsibilities in relation to protecting children from child criminal exploitation (CCE) and child sexual exploitation (CSE).

Split into bite-sized modules, the training has been designed to provide maximum learning potential in the leanest, most cost-effective and most time-efficient manner. It has been produced in high-quality remote video CPD format which is accessible on any device, any time, anywhere.

Developed by Robin Watts, international safeguarding expert and former police inspector, the course is split into eleven modules. The course consists of learning through video modules, completion of tasks, further reading and viewing external resources. Please consider this when planning and allocating your time. To successfully understand and achieve the objectives from the course, learners are expected to engage in all aspects of the learning process and complete all relevant activities to ensure they can successfully apply the knowledge and skills they have gained in their own setting.

Designed in line with the following policies

• Keeping Children Safe in Education
• Sexual Offences Act 2003
• Child Abduction Act 1984
• Children Act 1989

Learning Outcomes

• Understanding how to identify children vulnerable to being recruited into gangs and recognising the signs that they are being exploited for criminal or sexual activity.
• Recognising the process behind grooming children for exploitation and identifying risk factors and warning signs in order to develop an intervention process.
• Debunking the myths that shroud CCE and CSE and learning how to avoid preconceptions about gang culture and its victims.
• Recognising the dangers of CCE and CSE and the importance of your role in providing help and support to young people.
• Building basic interview skills to enable conversations with children about child protection issues and in order to raise any concerns.

Modules

Module 1: What is child criminal exploitation (CCE) and child sexual exploitation (CSE)?

Module one will provide you with the definition of child criminal exploitation and the legal definition of child sexual exploitation, including how they can take place.

Module 2: Understanding county lines

Module two will describe what county lines is and breakdown the definition of a ‘gang’, including what the minimum characteristic features are that typically tend to make up gang culture.

Module 3: Risk indicators and grooming models

Module three will cover the grooming techniques criminals use to lure children and young people into criminal activity and discuss the various risk factors that could make children vulnerable.

Module 4: What are the warning signs?

Module four will explore the warning signs often associated with child criminal and sexual exploitation and discuss what is meant by ‘cuckooing’ and how to recognise it.

Module 5: The myths and dangers of CCE and CSE

Module five will examine some common myths, misconceptions, dangers and vulnerabilities associated with child sexual exploitation and child criminal exploitation.

Module 6: Push and pull factors

In module six you will explore what push and pull factors are associated with CCE and CSE activity, look at protective factors and review Haringey’s Youth Justice Service’s analysis of 20 prolific young offenders.

Module 7: Helping children understand their environments

Module seven will cover how to help children and young people become more aware of their environments and identify risks, including early intervention techniques and increasing awareness.

Module 8: Contextual safeguarding and risk assessments

Module eight will define contextual safeguarding the context of child criminal and sexual exploitation as well as demonstrate what to consider during risk assessments.

Module 9: Legislation and reporting

Module nine will explore the core legislation that protects of children from CCE or CSE activity, what education schools can deliver and the importance of partnership working.

Module 10: Talking to potential victims and reporting

Module ten will provide you with practical tips around talking to potential victims, including how to ask the right questions, use the right language, respond to a disclosure and report cases for further investigation.

Module 11: Supporting victims and their families

Module eleven will look at the impact CCE and CSE can have on families and the type of additional support they may need once a case has come to light.