Back to school 2026: key legal and regulatory priorities for academies and maintained schools

Safeguarding: significant changes for September

The final version of Keeping Children Safe in Education (KCSIE) 2026 was published on 1 September 2026. Although it is largely consistent with the 'for information' version published over the summer, it contains some additional changes, including updates to the definition of sexual abuse, revised content on racism and prejudice-based harm, and a clarification of safer recruitment requirements in EYFS provision.

As ever, there are updated references, revised terminology and new expectations to get to grips with. Many of the terminology changes are intended to align KCSIE more closely with the 2026 version of Working Together to Safeguard Children, including references to Family Help and updated safeguarding definitions. Schools should ensure that safeguarding policies, training materials and internal procedures use terminology consistently and reflect the final September version.

One of the most immediate changes is the removal of the former condensed version of Part One at Annex A. All staff must now read Part One in full, including those who do not work directly with children. Schools should ensure that induction and September safeguarding training arrangements reflect this.

KCSIE now also includes guidance on children questioning their gender. It does not create any new legal obligations but re-states the legal position in one accessible place. Social transition is expressly treated as an active intervention which should be considered through a safeguarding lens. Schools should not initiate social transition; parents should ordinarily be involved unless doing so would create a safeguarding risk; and decisions should be subject to appropriate DSL oversight and properly recorded. The guidance also addresses single-sex toilets, changing facilities, boarding accommodation and sport.

There is also an important safer recruitment change: from 1 September, the previous supervision exemption from regulated activity with children is removed. Schools using volunteers should therefore review existing arrangements and their approach to DBS and barred-list checks. In addition, KCSIE now makes clear that, where a school is also subject to the EYFS framework, staff and volunteers must not begin work within the EYFS setting until the school has received their enhanced DBS certificate, including barred list information.

Other changes include strengthened expectations around filtering and monitoring, mental health, violence against women and girls, serious violence, harmful sexual behaviour, online safety and generative AI. The final version also updates the definition of sexual abuse to mirror Working Together to Safeguard Children and reinforces that children may experience prejudice-based harm, including racism, faith-based prejudice and other forms of discrimination, which should be considered within safeguarding practice where appropriate.

Alongside KCSIE, the updated Working Together to Safeguard Children introduces the Family Help model as part of the Families First Partnership programme. Family Help is intended to bring targeted early help and section 17 support together into a more seamless offer for families, with greater continuity of practitioner relationships. Schools should understand how these arrangements are being implemented locally and what role school staff may be expected to play.

For schools with EYFS provision, the revised statutory framework introduces detailed safer-sleep requirements, new expectations around screen use and a prohibition on providing childcare where banned dog breeds are present. There is also an important change to Ofsted notification requirements: the threshold for relevant allegations involving those living, working or looking after children on the premises changes from allegations of “serious harm” to “harm”.

RSHE and attendance

Revised statutory Relationships, Sex and Health Education guidance also applies from 1 September. It strengthens curriculum content around sexual harassment and violence, consent and healthy relationships, pornography and online harms, personal safety and criminal exploitation.

There is also a stronger emphasis on parental engagement and transparency. Schools should review not only their policy and curriculum, but how parents are informed about content and teaching materials, including resources provided by external organisations.

The statutory attendance guidance was updated in July. Among the operational clarifications, schools should take the register at the same time for all registered pupils, meaning settings using different registration windows for different cohorts should review their arrangements. The guidance also strengthens expectations around attendance analysis and leadership oversight and provides further clarification concerning medical evidence, remote education, leave of absence and attendance coding.

The DfE has also published a useful package of resources on communicating with parents about school attendance, including practical guidance, template communications and resources that schools can share with families. Most recently, it has added a Back-to-School Reset Guide, which provides practical advice for parents and carers on helping children prepare for the return to school. As schools should be reminding parents of their attendance expectations at the start of the academic year, this is a useful resource to consider signposting or sharing alongside those communications.

Behaviour: exclusion, off-site direction and restrictive interventions

The revised statutory guidance on suspension and permanent exclusion came into force on 26 July.

Changes include expanded guidance on unlawful exclusions and off-rolling, new guidance on temporarily separating pupils for safeguarding purposes, further clarification of managed moves and stronger expectations around safeguarding, SEND, equality, reintegration and governing-board scrutiny of pupil-movement data. Importantly, temporary separation for safeguarding purposes is not a disciplinary exclusion, even though it may involve a pupil temporarily being prevented from attending the premises.

For academies, there is a particularly significant change around off-site direction. Academy trusts now have an express statutory power under section 29A of the Education Act 2002 to direct a pupil to receive education off site to improve behaviour. The associated procedural framework includes written notification requirements, review arrangements and strengthened expectations around initial interventions, information sharing and reintegration. Academies should also check any directions made before 26 July which continue beyond that date against the transitional arrangements.

Schools should also ensure that the April 2026 requirements on restrictive interventions are properly embedded. Significant uses of force, seclusion and non-force-related restraint engage recording and reporting requirements, including same-day expectations. The wider guidance also emphasises prevention and de-escalation, the particular position of pupils with SEND and meaningful analysis of incident data.

From September, schools should also be following the statutory mobile phones guidance, with mobile phone-free environments expected by default throughout the school day.

Allergy safety: a new statutory framework

Academies and maintained schools are now directly subject to the new statutory allergy safety guidance.

Schools should have a dedicated allergy safety policy, clear senior leadership responsibility, appropriate staff training and robust arrangements for identifying pupils with allergies, managing medication and emergency response, and learning from serious incidents and near misses.

This should be approached as a whole-school compliance exercise, not simply a new policy. Individual Healthcare Plans and Allergy Action Plans, catering, trips, classroom activities, medication arrangements and connected policies should all be reviewed. Governors and trustees should also receive appropriate assurance that the arrangements are working in practice.

Complaints and data protection

Since 19 June 2026, section 164A of the Data Protection Act 2018 has required schools to facilitate the making of data protection complaints, acknowledge them within 30 calendar days and take appropriate steps to investigate and respond without undue delay.

Schools should build sufficient flexibility into their complaints arrangements to distinguish between straightforward standalone data protection complaints and wider parental complaints which happen to include a data protection issue. Privacy notices should also explain the right to make a data protection complaint.

The ICO's guidance on AI-generated Freedom of Information requests is also particularly relevant to academies and maintained schools. Its broader principles are useful across complaints, SARs and other correspondence: focus on substance, do not assume AI-generated material is accurate, clarify scope where necessary and respond proportionately.

Children's Wellbeing and Schools Act: what matters now?

The Children's Wellbeing and Schools Act 2026 is wide-ranging, but not every provision requires immediate action.

For this academic year, important changes include academies being expressly brought within the School Food Regulations from 29 June, expanded free school meal eligibility from September and new limits on compulsory branded uniform items: generally three items in primary and three in secondary, or four where one is a tie.

Other reforms, including universal breakfast-club provision and the future National Curriculum duty for academies, come later.

Ofsted from September 2026

Ofsted's revised school inspection toolkit, operating guide and inspection information apply from September.

The toolkit strengthens expectations across safeguarding, inclusion, SEND, attendance, behaviour, curriculum, personal development, Early Years and governance. In particular, there is greater emphasis on safeguarding pupils at heightened risk, medical conditions and allergy safety, safeguarding pupils with SEND, whole-school inclusion strategies, accessibility planning and SENCo leadership.

The practical message is important: inspection readiness is not simply about having the right policies. Schools should use the revised toolkit as a self-evaluation tool and consider whether they can evidence implementation, consistency and impact. Governors and trustees should understand the school's compliance position and the evidence supporting it.

Other developments this autumn

There are also a couple of further developments just beyond September which schools and trusts should have on their radar.

Employment law changes under the Employment Rights Act 2025 continue to be phased in. There are no major school-specific changes taking effect on 1 September, but a number of important measures follow in October 2026, including the extension of Employment Tribunal time limits from three to six months and strengthened duties around preventing workplace sexual harassment and third-party harassment. Our Employment Rights Act tracker is being regularly updated as the implementation timetable develops.

We will also be covering the latest developments at our Employment Law Update for Academies & Maintained Schools on 10 November 2026. Click here to book.

For academy trusts, the new Academy Trust Handbook 2026 also takes effect from 1 October 2026. The changes - which we covered in more detail in an earlier article here - include tighter requirements around executive pay, finance leadership, procurement, pensions, severance payments and financial transparency. Trusts should review the new Handbook now and ensure that any processes, board approvals or procurement arrangements affected by the changes are ready for October.

Priorities for the new academic year

With so much change, schools should continue to distinguish between what requires action now, what requires preparation and what simply needs monitoring.

For September, priorities include final KCSIE and RSHE implementation; reviewing attendance arrangements; embedding the exclusion, off-site direction and restrictive-intervention changes; implementing the allergy safety framework; updating data protection complaints arrangements; and reviewing readiness against the new Ofsted toolkit.

Looking further ahead, schools should continue to monitor SEND reform, the wider implementation of the Children's Wellbeing and Schools Act and the forthcoming mandatory reporting duty for child sexual abuse, alongside the other developments due to take effect during the academic year.

Across all of these developments, the recurring message is the same: updating the policy is only the starting point. Schools need to be confident that the change has translated into day-to-day practice, staff understanding and effective governance oversight.

If you missed our Back to School webinar, you can catch up on the key developments and practical takeaways by accessing the slides here.