Student Safety and Ignite Tutors’ Roles as Mandated Reporters
Download PDF of our Mandated Reporting here.
Our Partnership. Ignite Reading is humbled by and deeply appreciative of the opportunity to partner with you to support your students on their journey to becoming skilled readers. We consider it a privilege to be invited into your schools to support your students each day. Their safety and welfare is a critical part of our work with them.
One of the magical benefits of the daily tutoring Ignite Reading provides your students is the strong, meaningful bonds that are established between our tutors and your students. Ignite Reading tutors often become a trusted adult for their students and their shared time together becomes a safe space in which students confide in their tutor their experiences with abuse and neglect.
Our Legal and Moral Responsibility. Similar to your district and school site staff working directly with students, Ignite Reading tutors are trained mandated reporters and may be subject to the same mandated reporting laws as your district and school staff. Ignite Reading and our tutors have a legal and moral responsibility to file a mandated report to the appropriate agency when we reasonably suspect that a child may be the victim of abuse or neglect in jurisdictions where required by law.
Our Process and Timeline. We have and will continue to experience instances in which students share information with their Ignite Reading tutor that leads the tutor to reasonably suspect child abuse or child neglect may have occurred, they are required to take action consistent with the appropriate state process by taking the following steps:
| Timeline | Responsible Individual | Key Actions |
| A student shares information about an incident of suspected child abuse or neglect with the tutor or the tutor observes obvious signs of possible abuse or neglect | Tutor | Immediately documents pertinent information and details helpful to filing a mandated report and providing helpful, clear details to our point of contact at the partner school |
| Within 1-4 hours of interaction with their student | Tutor | Notifies Ignite Reading’s Tutor Support Team of the incident and provides clear and specific details for Ignite to share with our school/district partners |
| Within 1-2 hours of receiving notice of the incident from the tutor | Ignite Reading |
|
|
Within 2-3 hours of any change in the plan initially communicated to the school partner:
|
Ignite Reading |
Calls and emails the school POC immediately informing them of the changed course of action. Possible changes include:
|
Student and Family Data Requests. Certain state and/or local jurisdictions require student and family data to be included in order to finalize a mandated report. In those instances, Ignite Reading will reach out to the appropriate school and/or district contact to get that information and file the report in accordance with the law. This information will be held confidential and handled in accordance with our established data sharing agreement.
Important Note. Ignite Reading does not proactively report on our employees' behalf; however, there may be instances when a tutor fails to report or refuses to report an incident that Ignite Reading’s leadership believes meets the standard of reasonable suspicion. In those cases, Ignite Reading will file the mandated report in order to ensure the safety of the student. Conversely, there are times when tutors may decide to file a mandated report without informing Ignite Reading of doing so or against our recommendation.
Ignite Reading will provide timely and thorough information about these filings if and when they occur.