The International Schools Podcast podcast

July 06, 2024 133 - CIS Taskforce on Child Protection 10th year anniversary

Join us for a conversation with members of The International Taskforce on Child Protection (ITFCP).

As the taskforce celebrates its 10th anniversary, we take this opportunity to hear the story behind its founding and its mission to protect children across the international schools community and beyond.

We'll explore how international schools have and continue to adopt and adapt safeguarding standards, overcoming cultural and operational challenges to ensure a safe learning environment for all students. Our guests and members of the taskforce share their own learnings, opportunities, and challenges of collaborating across multiple international schools and organizations. We will also learn about the resources, services and professional development the taskforce provides to international school leaders and educators.

About Jane Larson

Jane Larsson has led the Council of International Schools (CIS) as Executive Director since her appointment in 2010. Over the past 25 years, Jane has led the international education community with a focus on the development of collaborative partnerships to enable and support educational exchange and the development of international and intercultural perspective.

Prior to her appointment at CIS, Jane was Director of International Partnerships with the Visiting International Faculty Program (VIF) in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, where she led outreach to promote international educational exchange, establishing relationships with ministries of education, universities, international schools and educational associations. She began her career in international education as the Director of Educational Staffing and Publications for International Schools Services (ISS) providing recruitment services and resources to international schools.

Jane lends her voice to key topics shaping the future of international education, those which enable school and university communities to provide socially responsible leadership as they continually develop their programs. She currently serves as Chair of the International Taskforce on Child Protection and on the Board of Directors of the International Commission Advancing Independent School Accreditation (ICAISA).

https://www.linkedin.com/in/janelarssoncis/

About Jane Foster-Sarre

Director, Safeguarding Works Ltd

Area of expertise provided as part of the CIS Affiliated Consultant Network:

Student Wellbeing: Protection, Safety, & Security including but not limited to

School safeguarding audits

Response to allegations of abuse and low level concerns

Safe recruitment and safe working practice

Policy development and review

Investigations and risk assessments

Jane is an independent safeguarding consultant providing expert advice on safeguarding and child protection. She specialises in promoting safe organisational culture, safeguarding in the workplace, and managing allegations and low level concerns against adults working with children.

Jane is a qualified teacher, who has also worked in schools as the Designated Safeguarding Lead and Safeguarding Governor across ages 4–18 years. She has also worked for statutory education and children’s services departments in the UK.

Following the exposure of the criminal actions of William Vahey who abused more than 50 children when employed at an international school based in the UK, Jane was part of the statutory case panel convened to review the case and lessons learned and worked closely with the school to restore confidence in the community and reinforce the safeguarding structure.

Jane is an accredited safer recruitment specialist and has contributed to IICSA - the UK Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual abuse. She is also a co-author of the International Protocol for Managing Allegations of Child Abuse by Educators and other Adults and the Guidance on Managing Low Level Concerns.

Jane is currently Co–Chair of the International Taskforce for Child Protection (ITFCP) Recruitment Reporting & Regulations Group.

Jane is an experienced auditor of safeguarding practice and has worked with international schools across the UK and Europe, Asia and Africa, both promoting best practice and responding to serious incidents where schools and boards need support.

Jane has extensive experience of designing and delivering safeguarding training including delivering the CIS Foundation Workshop on Safer Recruitment and supporting the Deep Dives.

As an independent advisor Jane has provided high-level safeguarding advice and training across the sectors including schools, universities, religious and sports organisations, charities, and private clients.

Jane is also a specialist advisor to the safeguarding boards of a UK Premier League football club, a private equity company providing residential care for children, and a faith organisation and is a member of the National Safeguarding Panels for both the Football Association and Sports Resolutions which offers advice to a range of sports

In addition to her independent role Jane is also a consultant for Barnardos, a UK based Children’s Charity. Jane is a regular speaker at events and is a well-known figure to many private, public and third sector organisations working with children, including state, independent and international schools.

About Dr. Christine Brown

Dr. Christine Brown is an international consultant specializing in advising educators on Program Design for Teaching and Learning, Child Protection, Social Emotional Learning initiatives, World Language and ELL programing, working with challenging student placements and managing parent expectations. From 2013 to 2023, Brown served as one of six Regional Education Officers (REOs) in the Office of Overseas Schools, United States Department of State. She covered the Western European Region and for several years also the South America region. Brown also served the DOS as one of 5 initial co-founders of the International Task Force on Child Protection.

As REO, she served on the Boards of ECIS, AAIE and AMISA. Prior to joining the Department of State in July 2013, she served as Deputy Director at the Carol Morgan School in the Dominican Republic. Brown served as an administrator in the Glastonbury, Connecticut Public Schools for 28 years, first as the Director of K-12 Foreign Languages and ELL, and for 8 years as the Assistant Superintendent for Curriculum and Instruction.

Brown has served as a president of state, regional and national language teacher organizations including the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages over her career. She chaired the American Language Standards Writing Task Force sponsored by the U.S. Department of Education as well as served as the consultant to the national Arabic and Korean language standards projects and as a consultant to the Startalk Language Project for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.

She served as a board member of the National Defense Education Language Program. Brown chairs the AERO World Languages Standards writing project for DOS. She has testified before the United States Congress on behalf of language education, and initiated and co-chaired the Year of Languages Campaign in the United States. In February 2019, she was awarded the Keith Miller Innovation Award from the Association for the Advancement of International Educators for her work in Child Protection around the world.

In March 2019 Brown received the Outstanding Graduate Student Award at Gwynedd Mercy University for her Doctoral Dissertation, The Effects of Early Foreign Language Study on English Reading Comprehension. In 2023, she received the NEASC Educator of the Year Award. In 2024, she received an AAIE Outstanding Educator Award and the ECIS Outstanding Educator of 2024 award.

About Keith Cincotta

Director of School Services andSenior Leadership Executive, International Schools Services

Keith has worked in the International Education sector for 25 years first as a School Counselor, later as a High School Principal and most recently as a Senior Leadership Executive and the Director of School Services at International Schools Services. As a school counselor in Allentown PA, Islamabad Pakistan and Dubai he worked with many survivors of abuse and was part of teams that responded to reports of abuse.

At ISS Keith is the representative to the International Task Force on Child Protection, is responsible for safeguarding initatives across ISS’ managed schools and presents professional development and training sessions for educators. Keith is a trained facilitator for Darkness to Light and has facilitated the program for school, church and community groups. Keith holds Master of Education degrees in both Counseling and Educational Leadership from Lehigh University.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/keith-cincotta-578b1a17/

About Debbie Downes

In August 2022, Debbie Downes joined The International Centre of Missing and Exploited Children as the Director of Global School Initiatives. In this role, she develops and provides child protection training, support, and resources to schools around the world. She has been supporting ICMEC’s work as a regional trainer since July 2020.

Debbie has worked in international education for 18 years, first as an elementary teacher, then as school principal, and then as Accreditation and Child Protection Lead for Quality Schools International. She developed and revised handbooks, policies, and resources to support child protection efforts at a group of 36 international schools. She also supported schools with on-site and virtual professional development.

Debbie’s background in child protection includes an MSW from the University of California at Berkeley and several years of experience working in the court unit of Children and Family Services in Contra Costa County, California. Debbie’s overseas career began with 3 years as a health education volunteer with the Peace Corps in Kolda, Senegal. She has since lived with her husband, 2 children, and 2 rescue dogs in Thailand, Turkmenistan, Azerbaijan, Slovenia, and her current location of Minsk, Belarus.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/debbie-downes-educator/

Resources