Monday 1 April 2019


SKCIN CONTINUES TO LEAD THE WAY IN EDUCATIONAL INTERVENTION WITH OUR UNIQUE ACCREDITATION PROGRAMMES



Skcin launched the UK’s first ever national educational ‘Accreditation' programme many years ago now and we continue to lead the way with the subsequent development of a suite of Accreditation programmes that cover key ’at risk’ and influential target sectors with the key objective of preventing skin cancer and promoting early detection to save lives.



Our pioneering work in educational intervention is our USP, we recognised many years ago that measuring outcomes is absolutely key to offering a sustainable resource, not just a short lived ‘campaign’ that’s here today and forgotten tomorrow. It needs a direct strategic approach that has longevity



Most importantly, all our accreditation programmes are annual, requiring participants to review, refresh and reinforce year on year. 



OUR SUN SAFE SCHOOLS NATIONAL ACCREDITATION PROGRAMME IS NOW TEACHING & REACHING OVER 620,000 CHILDREN AND THEIR FAMILIES NATIONWIDE….



Teaching children from a young age the importance of sun safety to influence behaviour for a positive, sun safe, skin cancer free future is a no-brainer. Every child in the UK goes to school and ALL schools have a duty of care to safeguard these children whilst being best placed to educate them. It’s also the perfect way to reach the parents and families of every child, engaging the wider school community in vital sun safe messaging.



With Spring finally in the air, registrations to our Sun Safe Schools Accreditation programme are ramping up and we are busy packing and despatching comprehensive free resources to every school that registers. These printed resources include; A comprehensive welcome pack and accreditation guide with copies of all educational lesson plans, activities and worksheets; stickers for all children;  books for the school library and the required number of our ’sun safety and skin cancer’ information booklets that get sent home with a bespoke letter to all parents. These resources complement the on-line accreditation programme which supports schools in its implementation



But that’s not where the support ends. Schools are a tough nut to crack and constant support is crucial. Last year our schools support service assisted schools directly with over 8k emails with teachers and parents  This puts a huge amount of strain on our time and resources, but we are committed to assisting schools in every way we can. Our schools work is all funded solely by the charity



There is a much bigger picture here though! As government calls for ‘blue-sky’ thinking when it comes to preventing skin cancer - what we offer is a strategic and robust solution and has been proposed to Government in many times via lobbying in the past with Melanoma Taskforce and ongoing work with the Department of Education and our submission to the Public Consultation on school’s curriculum content last year This tireless work goes on behind the scenes in addition to work supporting our service users.



UV awareness and skin cancer have always been regarded as a public health issue and not an educational one. The fact is that they are inextricably linked is part of the challenge we face in addition to so many other priorities placed on Government. These things take much time to implement, but Skcin is in this for the long haul. We been offering our educational solutions for six years, Australia who take the lead in this field have taken this seriously and they are 20 years ahead, so this is marathon, not sprint.





If the UK ever sort out BREXIT, maybe important issues relating to the nations future health can take the prominence in government our future generations deserve, in the meantime, we continue our work to raise awarness of skin cancer, promote early detection sun safety and engage and lobby Government and highlight our work 

For more information about our work visit www.skcin.org


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