Haberdashers’ Aske’s School for Girls (Habs) has hosted its first pastoral conference, themed around empowering excellence in pupil support.

Close to 300 delegates attended, where headline speaker Professor Tanya Byron (child and adolescent mental health psychologist and author of The Skeleton Cupboard), delivered a speech on how we are ‘raising our children in captivity’. She encouraged the audience to remind children that failure is an experience and not something to fear.

Headmistress of Habs, Rose Hardy, said: “This was an important event both for the school and our community. Never has it been more vital for schools to support students pastorally in a complex world faced with multiple and evolving challenges.”

Hardy added: “We are passionate about raising the bar in pastoral care and our conference certainly delivered on its promise to inspire and energise all who attended, while equipping them with a wealth of practical information, new connections, ideas and best-practice approaches for the future.”

Topics included helping young people to find their own identities outside of potentially toxic friendship groups, spotting the signs of substance abuse, how to help students make safer choices around drugs and alcohol, supporting bereaved children and understanding unhealthy coping strategies in young people.

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