Risk Assessment

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Introduction

The Risk Assessment module equips school leaders, safety coordinators, and teaching staff with a structured, auditable framework to create, evaluate, approve, and communicate risk assessments across the entire school estate and curriculum.

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Conceptual Architecture

The module structures risk assessment records into a transparent lifecycle that balances thorough hazard evaluation with ongoing operational accountability:

• Assessment Dossier: Each record captures an activity title, location, categorised risk area, assigned author/owner, designated approver, identified groups at risk (Students, Staff, Visitors, Other), and additional statutory or procedural notes.
• Risk Areas & Taxonomies: Risk assessments are organised into customisable thematic areas (e.g. Science, PE & Sports, Off-site Educational Visits, Site & Premises, Design & Technology, General), allowing schools to delegate oversight to department heads.
• Hazard & Control Matrix: Hazards are evaluated by combining residual Likelihood (Rare to Highly likely) and Severity (Slight harm to Extreme harm). The resulting score determines a colour-coded hazard level from Very Low (Acceptable) to Very High (Unacceptable). The highest hazard level defines the overall risk level for the entire assessment.
• Action Delegation: Follow-up tasks (e.g. staff briefings, equipment inspections, policy reviews) can be assigned to named staff members with specific due dates and automated email notifications.
• Approval & Invalidation State Machine: Designated approvers review assessments. Once approved, any subsequent edit made to hazards, controls, or metadata automatically resets the status to Updated, invalidating the approval and requiring re-evaluation. Assessments also expire after 12 months, triggering annual review alerts.
• Mandatory Read Confirmations: Once an assessment is approved, staff can record formal read confirmations. If an assessment is subsequently updated and re-approved, staff who previously confirmed it are notified to re-confirm their understanding of the amendments.
• Confidentiality & Privacy: Assessments containing sensitive personal, medical, or behavioural management information can be locked as Confidential, restricting visibility to administrators, the owner, the approver, and explicitly granted staff.
• Multi-Academy Trust (MAT) Integration: In multi-school trust environments, central risk assessments can be distributed to member schools for central policy synchronisation or cloned for local school adaptation.

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Roles & Permissions Matrix

The module employs role-based permissions to ensure clear segregation of duties between leadership governance, technical review, and operational authoring:

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User Interface & Screen Tour

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1. Master Risk Assessments Dashboard

Accessible from the main navigation sidebar, the dashboard displays a filterable table of all risk assessments:

• Live Search: Rapidly locate assessments by activity title, location, or risk area.
• Multi-Dimensional Filters: Filter records by Area, Owner, Approver, Groups at Risk (Students, Staff, Visitors, Other), and Status (Approved, Unapproved, Due for review, Overdue, Changed).
• Confirmations Toggle: Click the tick icon in the table header to filter exclusively to assessments you have confirmed or have been requested to confirm.
• Archived & Orphaned Views: Toggle to inspect archived assessments, or filter for orphaned records where the owner or approver has left the school.
• Colour-Coded Risk Indicators: Visual left-hand border indicators convey overall risk level at a glance (Grey = Not set / No hazards, Green = Very low / Low, Yellow = Medium, Orange = High, Red = Very high).
• Bulk Actions & PDF Export: Select multiple assessments to generate combined PDF dossiers, change risk areas, reassign owners or approvers, or trigger email reminders.

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2. Risk Assessment Detailed View

Clicking any assessment opens its full operational workspace:

• Header & Metadata Panel: Displays activity name, area, location, owner, approver, assessment date, approved date, groups at risk, and additional methodology notes.
• Hazards & Controls List: Detailed breakdown of every identified hazard with individual likelihood and severity ratings, calculated risk scores, and expandable lists of preventive controls.
• Drag-and-Drop Reordering: Use handle icons to intuitively reorder hazards and control measures.
• Action Items Panel: Lists all delegated tasks, assigned staff members, completion deadlines, and status indicators.
• Top-Right Action Menu: Provides quick options to Edit Details, Copy Assessment, Approve / Unapprove, toggle Confidentiality, view History, manage Confirmations, or Print PDF.
• Comments Thread: Engage in collaborative staff discussions directly on the assessment record.

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3. Confirmations Management Screen

Accessible via Confirmations in the assessment menu:

• View a complete breakdown of staff who have confirmed reading the assessment (Confirmed, Unconfirmed, Previously confirmed).
• Toggle between assigned readers and all school staff to add or remove individual staff or groups in bulk.
• Dispatch manual confirmation reminder emails to staff with outstanding confirmations.

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4. History & Audit Trail

Accessible via History in the assessment menu:

• Comprehensive chronological log documenting every modification made to the assessment.
• Tracks exact changes to activities, locations, owners, approvers, hazards, likelihoods, severities, controls, actions, approvals, and confidentiality toggles, timestamped with the acting user’s name.

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5. Administration Screens (/riskassess/admin)

Restricted to Risk Assessment Manager and Administrator roles:

• Risk Areas (/admin/areas): Create new departmental areas, rename categories, and adjust display ordering.
• Approvers (/admin/approvers): Appoint staff members with formal approval authority and review inherited approver permissions.

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Deep-Dive Workflows