Staff Code of Conduct with Students

1Preamble: Closeness Needs Bright Lines

HIS is a sandbox where adults and students work unusually closely: coaches mentor whole lives, experts supervise real research, workplace mentors guide real work, older and younger students share houses. That closeness is the model — and it is exactly why this Code exists. Boundaries are not the opposite of closeness; they are what make closeness safe. Clear lines protect students from harm, and they equally protect good adults from misunderstanding.

This Code sets those lines. It operationalizes the Child Protection & Safeguarding Policy (J.1) and binds every adult in every HIS context — campus, trips, competitions, online, and workplaces. Where any other policy or instruction appears to conflict with this Code, this Code prevails.

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2Two Tests

When a situation is not covered by a specific rule, every adult applies two tests:

1. The transparency test. Would I be comfortable if this interaction — its content, place, and tone — were seen by the student's parents, my colleagues, and the Designated Safeguarding Lead (DSL)? If not, don't.
2. The whose-need test. Does this interaction meet the student's need, or an adult's? Adults never use students to meet their own emotional or social needs.

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3Language and Interaction

Adults at HIS are warm, boundaried, and professional:

• Challenge hard, respect completely: no humiliation, shaming, sarcasm that wounds, or discussion of a student's failings in front of others.
• No favoritism and no exclusion: no "special" students marked by privileges, secrets, or nicknames that single out.
• No secrets. An adult never asks a student to keep a secret from parents or the school. Confidences are honored within safeguarding limits, and students are told those limits honestly ("If you tell me something that means you're not safe, I have to pass it on").
• No discussion with students of an adult's private life beyond the ordinary, and never of romantic, sexual, or financial matters; no comments on students' bodies or attractiveness — including in athletics and dance, where D.43/J.10 language standards apply to weight and physique.
• Romantic or sexual conduct of any kind toward a student is abuse. This includes students over 18 and recent conduct initiated pre-graduation. There are no exceptions.

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4One-to-One Contact

Individual mentoring is core to HIS (M.27) — and it happens visibly:

• One-to-one meetings occur in rooms with glass panels or open doors, in view of others, during normal hours, and are logged in the school system when scheduled.
• No adult is alone with a student in a closed, unobservable space, a private residence, or a vehicle (except emergencies, reported immediately afterward).
• Research supervision, instrument lessons, athletic coaching, and counseling follow the same visibility rules; rooms used for them must allow sight lines.
• If a student seeks out an adult in a non-visible setting, the adult moves the conversation to a visible one and, if the matter is sensitive, involves the DSL or counselor.

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5Physical Contact

• Default: minimal, purposeful, public, and with the student's assent. Appropriate: handshakes, high-fives, comfort for a distressed young child in view of others, first aid, safety interventions (grabbing a child from danger).
• Sport, dance, music, and craft sometimes require instructional contact (spotting, positioning, technique adjustment). It is: explained first ("I'm going to adjust your elbow"), done in view of others, minimal, and stopped on any sign of discomfort. Squad-specific norms are set in writing under J.10.
• Early Years and Primary intimate care (toileting, changing, medical) follows J.6 exactly.
• Physical punishment, aggressive contact, and contact in anger are absolutely prohibited.
• Restraint is used only to prevent imminent harm, by the minimum force, by trained staff where possible, and is always reported same-day to the DSL.

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6Communication and Digital Conduct

• All adult–student communication runs through approved school channels (school email, LMS, official team/program apps) — never personal phone numbers, personal email, personal social media, gaming platforms, or disappearing-message apps (M.12, J.8).
• Staff do not friend, follow, or accept current students on personal social media. (Public, official school accounts are exempt.)
• Messages to individual students are professional in content and tone, sent at reasonable hours (emergencies and time-zone-sensitive trip logistics excepted), and always visible to oversight — group channels by default; a necessary individual message is one a parent could read without concern.
• Photography and filming of students only on school devices/accounts and only within K.10 consents. No student images on personal devices or personal accounts.

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7Off Campus: Trips, Competitions, and Transport

• Trips follow P.5–P.6 staffing ratios; at least two vetted adults with any student group; gender-appropriate supervision arrangements for overnight stays.
• Adults never share sleeping quarters with students; room checks are done in pairs, at announced times, doors open.
• Staff do not transport a single student in a private vehicle except with prior leadership approval or in an emergency (reported afterward). School transport rules (P.7) apply otherwise.
• On trips, this entire Code applies 24 hours a day; relaxed settings do not relax boundaries, and staff remain substance-free throughout (M.15).

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8Internships, Sister Companies, and External Adults

The sandbox extends into real workplaces; this Code extends with it:

• Every placement host — including sister companies — signs safeguarding terms as part of its agreement (D.50–D.51): named and vetted workplace mentors, briefed on this Code's core rules, with a named school supervisor for every placed student.
• Workplace one-to-one contact follows the same visibility principle: normal work settings, normal hours, observable spaces. No workplace mentor arranges private, off-site, or out-of-hours contact with a student.
• Work communication runs through workplace systems or school channels — not personal messaging.
• Students are briefed before every placement on these rules and on exactly whom to call (D.54); any concern about treatment at a placement goes same-day to the school supervisor and DSL.
• Visiting experts, judges, investors, and guest instructors are covered by J.4: vetted or always supervised, never alone with students.

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9Gifts, Money, and Private Arrangements

• Adults do not give individual students personal gifts (program-wide recognition per D.35 is the channel), do not accept gifts beyond M.14 limits, and never give money to or borrow from students or families.
• No private paid arrangements with students the adult currently teaches or coaches (M.13); any private arrangement with an HIS family is disclosed.
• Employment of students happens only through the On-Campus Internship Policy (D.49) — never informally.

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10Recognizing and Reporting Concerns

Every adult is trained (J.1) to recognize grooming patterns — boundary-testing, special attention, gifts, secrecy, isolating a child, contact drift to private channels — in others and to notice drift in themselves.

• Concern about a child: report to the DSL same-day, however small.
• Concern about an adult's conduct with students, including "low-level" unease that isn't an allegation: report under J.9 same-day. Low-level reporting is protective for everyone — patterns are visible only if fragments are reported.
• An adult who realizes a situation has drifted (a student's attachment, an unwise channel, an interaction that failed the transparency test) reports it themselves to the DSL or their leader. Self-reporting early is treated as professionalism, not misconduct.
• Suspicion of abuse is reported under J.1 immediately — never investigated privately, never "monitored" informally.

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11Breaches

Breaches are handled under J.9/J.1 and M.10. Because these rules protect children, the threshold is strict: deliberate boundary violations — covert communication channels, secrecy with a student, romantic/sexual conduct, physical abuse, failure to report — are gross misconduct warranting dismissal and, where applicable, referral to authorities and regulators. Inadvertent, promptly self-reported lapses are corrected through guidance and training. The distinction that governs everything: transparency. What was open can usually be fixed; what was hidden is the harm.

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12Acknowledgment

Signed at appointment, re-affirmed annually with safeguarding training; placement mentors sign the placement version:

I have read and understood the HIS Staff Code of Conduct with Students. I accept its rules and its two tests, and I understand my duty to report concerns — including about myself.

Name: ______________________ Role: ______________________

Signature: ______________________ Date: ______

Owned by the Designated Safeguarding Lead; reviewed annually (safeguarding sections) and biennially in full; approved by the Board. The version in the current Employee Handbook (M.1) is authoritative. Where a translation is provided, the English version prevails.

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