Social Media Policy

South Hill Park Pre-School has a Facebook page available to a closed group. This is a communication tool for the setting. We will use it to:

• Promote certain events such as parent consultations, trips, social events & visitors

• Update parents on staff training & development

• Give hints and tips for activities the children have enjoyed and home learning ideas

• To give news

• To show photos of activities, trips or special events

• To invite your thoughts & comments.

• Provide parents/carers who don’t know each other, with a means of contacting each other without having to ask Pre-school to do it for them. 

• Reuniting lost property to the correct person. 

• Advertise support needed for fundraising and maintenance events

The Pre-School Manager, Deputy Manager, Chair, Secretary and Events Coordinator of the committee are the page administrators and will update the page on a regular basis.  Committee members are identified as Moderators on the page. Parents are invited to add posts to the group page and these will be reviewed first by the administrators before being accepted.

The page administrators reserve the right to remove any comments at any time. The intent of the policy is to protect the privacy and rights of the Pre-school, staff & families.

We will remove any postings that:

• Name specific individuals in a negative way

• Are abusive or contain inappropriate language or statements

• Use defamatory, abusive or generally negative terms about any individual

• Do not show proper consideration for others privacy

• Breach copyright or fair use laws

• Contain any photos of children without necessary parental consent

• Advertise or sell products or services without permission

• Are not directly related to the Pre-school and our aims

• Promotes fundraising for charities other than the Pre-school without permission

If you would like to report an inappropriate comment, please tag one of the administrators.

No photographs taken within the Pre-School setting or at Pre-School special events and outings with the children which identify children, are to be posted for public viewing, without permissions in place, except those of your own child.  Parents are advised that they do not have a right to photograph anyone else’s child or to upload photos of anyone else’s children. The Pre-school shares photographs of the children at play, in the parents closed group. However, we seek permission from each child’s parent to post photographs that show their child’s face.  Where permission has not been given a child’s face will be obscured if they are in a photo that is being shared of others. If a parent would prefer that their child is not shown even with their face obscured we ask that they let us know in writing.   

To be able to maintain appropriate controls of professionalism and safeguarding, Pre-school has identified the following requirements for the management of this group:  

• Only current parents/carers (persons with legal responsibility for the child), staff and current committee members may be members.  

• When new children start at Pre-school, the parents/carers will be sent an invite to join us on email. New parents/carers will be invited to join shortly after the induction evening.  

• Membership of the group is entirely voluntary and parents/carers may leave or join at any time. However, some information is only available on the Facebook group.

• When children leave Pre-school, the parents/carers will be removed from the group. This removal will happen during the summer holidays.

The Pre-school also has a public Facebook Page.  The rules around its contents remain the same as our closed group.  Anyone can like and follow this group.  Please be aware that photographs and comments posted on the public group are in the public domain and can be seen and shared worldwide.

We recognise that social media has become a part of everyday life for many people and as such it is necessary to set our terms around the use of social media in connection with how the Pre-school is presented publicly.  This includes (but is not limited to) the following: 

• Social networking sites (e.g. Facebook, Bebo, Snapchat)  

• Blogs  

• Discussion forums  

• Collaborative online spaces  

• Media sharing services (i.e. YouTube, TikTok)  

• Micro-blogging (i.e. Twitter) 

If you have any negative opinions or concerns about any aspect of how Pre-school is run, please do not discuss it on social media. Such concerns should always be reported to the Manager so that they can be investigated, discussed and resolved formally.  

Please do not create any social media friendships with staff/volunteers at Pre-school – this is so that the Manager can be confident that the correct professional relationships are being maintained between staff and parents.  

The Pre-school will make an exception to the above rule if a parent has an existing relationship with an employee/volunteer before your child starts at Pre-school. This rule no longer applies once your child has left the Pre-school.

Should you already have a social media friendship with staff, to ensure messages and concerns are dealt with in line with Pre-school procedures, please do not use social media platforms, (or WhatsApp / text) to contact the member of staff about Pre-school related things. Messages and concerns should be passed on via the office, either in email or by telephone.

Last reviewed: July 2023