Home while away

One of the activities that has been most affected by safeguarding concerns is accommodating children in people’s homes.

Whilst hotel, hostel and youth centre based school trips continue to be popular and effective, home stays are reported to be declining in popularity. Concerns about ensuring the safety of children are quoted as one reason for that decline and all too often the response has been increased paperwork; hardly an enabling process.

What follows is a guide to good practice based on a reasonable and practical mix of dynamic risk management, informed decision making and appropriate documentation.

What is home hosting?
Home hosting is where visiting groups and individuals are accommodated as guests in the homes of local families. Host families and schools act as suppliers for the tour arranger and there will be legal liability for their actions. Effective safeguarding should consider the various circumstances that may apply in home hosting and ensure appropriate measures are put in place. It would be an error to think one size fits all, and to assist such consideration it is useful to define the major categories of home hosting.

Short stay hosting is where accommodation is arranged for each pupil in a number of homes on a tour for one or two night’s duration, often with several separate stays on an extended tour. It is on an unpaid basis and there is no expectation of reciprocal arrangements (this arrangement is not uncommon on long haul sports tours and sometimes referred to as billeting).  
    
Longer stay and paid hosting (for example exchange visits and work experience) is defined as either where: pupils are hosted by the same family for the whole or greater part of a visit and commonly there is an expectation that there will be a reciprocal nature to the visits; or there is a payment made to the host family for the stay.  

Selection of Host Families
In all cases and of critical importance is that the selection and allocation of host families should be done by a responsible person who is able to ensure the suitability of the match. This can be done in a number of ways, by the host school, the visiting school or a third party, such as a local agent or a tour operator. To ensure clear understanding this responsibility should be agreed and clearly stated in writing.

When looking to assess matching guest with host the initial factors that should be considered are: gender; cultural issues; medical needs & disabilities; and distance from main activity base and facilities available.
    
Unless by exception, accommodation should be in pairs or multiples, and prior agreement should be obtained from the necessary people before single accommodation arrangements are confirmed.
    
Short stays
With regard to short stay hosting, the short stay at each location will reduce some potential risk factors, such as unsupervised family days, but require more focus elsewhere.
    
It is prudent to recognise that host families involved in this kind of stay, without the added impetus of reciprocal expectation, commercial gain or long-term involvement, will perhaps not respond to requests for detailed family questionnaires, which they may consider unnecessarily intrusive. However, the need for good safe selection remains. It should be anticipated that the vetting and allocation of host families by the host organisation is more appropriate and therefore more likely.
    
So, in order to provide suitable hosts it is important that they have sufficient information provided, which should include: name, age and gender of pupils, plus any special requirements such as food, medical or cultural issues; minimum standards of accommodation required; information on the dynamic risk management process to ensure it can operate effectively; the visiting school’s code of conduct; and contact numbers, including emergency contacts and medical insurance information.

Longer stays
With regard to longer stay and paid hosting, the greater involvement in family life requires greater consideration of free time activities, but the greater reciprocal arrangements means that shared and remote vetting and allocation of host families is more practicable, in other words there is a greater involvement of the visiting school in the process. In addition to providing the information above, more detailed host family information should be requested from all families and made available to the visiting group leader. This should include:  verification of family structure; references; confirmation of house rules; and proposed family activities during visit.
    
There should also be agreement on: proposed transportation, including drivers; permission to share information between host families; and permission for a home visit by trip organiser or competent person to confirm facts and ensure that obvious risks / hazards are identified, including, but not limited to, accommodation type and fire safety, security, electrical appliances and other utilities, general hygiene, structure of property and presence of internal individual gas heaters in property.

Legislation
All host family arrangements in the UK should conform to the requirements of the local and national legislation designed to protect vulnerable groups; details of which can be obtained from the Disclosure and Barring Service or Disclosure Scotland (note: the regulation and application of the two organisations are not the same).
    
Organisers should also ensure their insurances cover all aspects of the visit, including anticipated free-time activities and other actions of the host families.

Host families when selected should receive the following information about their guests: name, age and gender of charge, plus any dietary requirements or necessary medical or cultural information; contact numbers, including emergency contacts and medical insurance information; and the visiting school’s code of conduct. Information for host families overseas may need to be in the host language.

Visiting Group Preparation
It is important that informed decisions can be made by schools, parents and pupils. Accurate written information and parents’ evenings are useful measures to ensure this can be achieved.
    
Before asking parents to commit, there is certain information required, such as what the planned host family selection and allocation arrangements are (ie: how and who will be selecting the hosts.

They should be given details of the safeguards and dynamic risk management process whilst on tour, the visit code of conduct, and personal safety guidance for pupils, linked to the dynamic risk management process.
    
Information required before departure include contact telephone numbers, including a 24 hour emergency number, sleeping and sharing arrangements, and where available, host family information, the names of the responsible adult in the families, and specific house rules.

Dynamic Risk Management
Whereas careful preparation and planning is important, equal consideration should be given to managing any situation whilst on tour.

In all cases allocation arrangements should be known and agreed between the host and visiting organisations before arrival.  

It is important that visiting group leaders are able to manage exceptional and unacceptable circumstances locally and the safeguards should be in place and viable for the group leaders to implement. This includes having contact numbers for local support, such as host school staff, tour operator agents or representatives, and accurate written information held by all leaders on location of pupils. Information for pupils enabling 24 hour contact for more than one leader must be given, and there must be an emergency ‘visit at once’ code between pupils and leaders.
    
Physical or telephone contact with all pupils within two hours of allocation should be made and a means by which group leaders can contact pupils every day (physical or telephone) should be given.
    
There must also be a means by which accommodation inspections can be undertaken on request, and a process and means to move pupils away from unsuitable accommodation or to a place of safety if necessary. Finally, opportunity should be taken to ensure feedback is taken, distributed accordingly, reviewed and acted upon.

Further information
www.schooltravelforum.com