08/12/2020
So often, I see schools posting photographs of children on their pages, and have often wondered about safety of this. So I went and did some research.
Normally a school adds a clause to their admissions policy requesting parents to give rights to firstly take photos of child and secondly use photos of child, but the law in protection of children sees this not as a one size fits all situation.
Firstly, when you are using the photos of children it needs to be for marketing purpose only, so taking photos of children in a teacher getting engaged at your school or when a farmyard came to school, is not marketing, yes the farmyard is a organizational activity and photos can be taken and kept for proof.
Marketing is related to advertising your business for purpose of growth.
Therefore dear school owners, that clause you are allowing parents to sign, is tantamount to opening your door for prosecution.
We live in a day and age when children are not safe, parents are trying their best to have fairly normal well rounded society integrated children, therefore it is our responsibility as schools to ensure we are not bringing harm to children through the lens of a camera used at our school.
How do you overcome this, don't put a blanket clause, rather if you are going to take photos, allow parents to sign a acceptance letter and that they know the risks of their child's photos being used, also ensure that parents give you permission to post on facebook or your website and lastly ensure that the photos are solely used for marketing, not just random facebook posts.
Child protection needs to be a priority in our schools.