Parents trust your academy with their children every week. Keeping those children safe is the most important thing you do — more important than any drill, result or trophy. In the UK, that responsibility comes with legal duties: checking the people who work with children, having a clear safeguarding policy, and knowing what to do when there is a concern.

This guide explains DBS checks — who needs one, which level, who arranges it and how often — and what a good safeguarding policy for a sports academy covers.

Important: This article is general guidance, not legal advice. The Disclosure and Barring Service (gov.uk/dbs), your sport's governing body and the NSPCC Child Protection in Sport Unit (thecpsu.org.uk) publish detailed guidance for sport.

Who is responsible

Your academy is. The organisation that runs sessions for children is responsible for safeguarding them: deciding which checks each role needs, making sure they are done, keeping records, and acting on concerns. AcademyApp is the software you run your academy with; it does not carry out checks or safeguarding on your behalf.

What a DBS check is

The Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) issues criminal record checks in England and Wales. In Scotland the equivalent is the PVG scheme run by Disclosure Scotland, and in Northern Ireland checks come from AccessNI.

There are four levels:

Basic: unspent convictions and conditional cautions. Anyone can apply for their own.
Standard: spent and unspent convictions, cautions, reprimands and warnings.
Enhanced: everything in a standard check, plus information the local police consider relevant.
Enhanced with the children's barred list: an enhanced check that also shows whether the person is barred from working with children.

Who needs a check, and which level

Most coaches in an academy that works with children need an enhanced check with the children's barred list. That level applies to people in regulated activity with children. In sport, that means teaching, training, instructing, coaching or supervising children without being supervised yourself, when it happens:

frequently — once a week or more;
intensively — on four or more days in any 30-day period; or
overnight — between 2am and 6am, with the chance of face-to-face contact (for example on camps or trips).

A coach running a weekly children's session, or a holiday camp across several days, is almost always in regulated activity.

Other roles — an occasional helper who is always supervised, someone who only handles bookings — may need a lower level or none. Your governing body's guidance helps you decide role by role. When in doubt, check.

It is a criminal offence for a barred person to work in regulated activity with children, and for an organisation to knowingly let them.

Who arranges it

Enhanced checks are requested by the organisation, not by the individual. Your academy asks the person to apply through a registered body — most small organisations use an umbrella body that processes checks on their behalf. Some governing bodies run checks for their registered coaches.

The applicant gives their details and proves their identity; the certificate is sent to the applicant, who shows it to you. Keep a record of the certificate number, its date and the level checked.

How often to renew

A DBS certificate has no expiry date — it is accurate on the day it was issued. Two good practices keep checks current:

The DBS Update Service. If the person subscribes within 30 days of their certificate being issued, you can check online, with their permission, whether anything has changed since. It also lets a coach take the same check from one organisation to another, where the level and workforce match.
Re-checking on a cycle. Many governing bodies ask for a fresh check every three years. Follow your sport's rule if it has one.

Your duty to refer

If you remove someone from working with children — or would have, had they not left — because they harmed a child or posed a risk of harm, you have a legal duty to refer them to the DBS.

Safeguarding is more than a DBS check

A check is only one part of keeping children safe. A good safeguarding set-up for an academy includes:

A written safeguarding policy that every coach reads and follows, reviewed every year.
A designated safeguarding lead (welfare officer) that coaches, parents and children know how to reach.
Safeguarding training for everyone working with children, renewed regularly.
Safer recruitment: references, identity checks and the right DBS level before someone starts.
A code of conduct for coaches: supervision ratios, changing rooms, physical contact, transport.
Safe communication: messages to children go through parents or academy channels, never private one-to-one chats.
Photos and video only with parents' consent, and never shared beyond what they agreed.
A clear way to report concerns, to your safeguarding lead and, where a child may be at risk, to the local authority's children's services or the police. Allegations against staff go to the Local Authority Designated Officer (LADO).
Records of concerns and actions, kept securely.

The NSPCC Child Protection in Sport Unit's Standards for Safeguarding are a good framework to check yourself against.

How AcademyApp helps

DBS checks and your safeguarding policy are arranged by you, for your academy. AcademyApp supports the way you work with children every day.

It's on your checklist from day one. When you first sign in, AcademyApp asks you to confirm you understand your academy is responsible for safeguarding, including the checks the law requires. You can mark it as understood or choose "Review later" and come back to it.
Coaches see what they need. Each coach works in their own account and sees the sessions and participants they coach.
Parents' consents are recorded. Consent for photos and for using a child's image publicly is recorded with each child's details, so you know what each family agreed.
Health information stays with the right people. Allergies, medical notes and emergency contacts are kept with the child's record, not in group chats.

Safeguarding is never finished: it is a habit your whole academy keeps. Get the right DBS level for every role, keep checks current, have a policy everyone follows, and make it easy to raise a concern. Parents will notice — and so will the children.

If you are still running your academy from spreadsheets and WhatsApp groups, creating an AcademyApp account gives your coaches, consents and set-up checklist a proper home from the start.