Categories are the classification system your school uses to describe the type of concern in each incident. When staff record an incident, they select one or more categories to indicate what kind of concern it is — such as Physical, Emotional, Neglect, or Online Safety.
Well-configured categories help your school track patterns, filter incidents, and generate meaningful insights.
Managing categories requires Deputy DSL or above, or the School Admin role.
Student and staff categories
Student incidents and staff incidents have separate category sets, managed in different places. The Categories settings page covers student incident categories only. Staff incident categories are managed under the separate Staff Categories item in the sidebar.
For example, your student incident categories might include Neglect and Online Safety, while staff incident categories might include Conduct and Allegation.
Managing categories
Go to Settings > Categories to view and manage your categories.
Adding a new category
Open category settings
Navigate to Settings > Categories.
Click Add Category
Click the Add Category button to open the creation form.
Enter the category details
Provide the following:
- Name — a clear, concise label for the category (e.g. “Physical”, “Emotional Abuse”, “Online Safety”)
- Description — an optional description to help staff understand what the category covers
- Colour — a colour to help visually distinguish this category in lists and charts
- Enabled/Disabled — toggle whether the category is available for selection when recording incidents. Disabling a category hides it from new incidents without affecting existing records.
- High priority — toggle to mark the category as high priority. Incidents with a high priority category bypass working schedules for alerts, ensuring staff are notified immediately regardless of the time.
- Requires sub-category — available on top-level categories only. Turn it on when the category is too broad on its own: staff who choose it must then pick one of its sub-categories before they can save the incident.
- Hide in parent mode — toggle to hide this category from the parent-facing view
Save
Click Save to create the category. It is now available for staff to select when recording incidents.
Editing categories
Click on an existing category to edit its name or colour. Changes take effect immediately and apply to all future incidents. Existing incidents that already use the category will reflect the updated name and colour.
Custom fields
You can configure custom fields that appear on incident forms based on categories, student groups, and student properties. Custom fields are managed separately from categories — see Custom Fields for details.
Tips for setting up categories
Keep categories broad enough to be useful, but specific enough to be meaningful. Too few categories make it hard to identify patterns. Too many categories make it hard for staff to choose the right one and can dilute your data.
Use consistent naming. Stick to clear, commonly understood terms. Avoid abbreviations or internal jargon that new staff might not recognise.
Review your categories periodically. As your school’s safeguarding needs evolve, revisit your category list to make sure it still reflects the types of concerns you are seeing.
Deleting a category changes your existing records. When you delete a category, it is removed from every incident it was linked to — not just from the list staff choose from. Incidents recorded under that category lose it, which affects your historical reporting and any filters or insights that relied on it.If you simply want to stop staff using a category from now on, disable it instead. Disabling hides the category from new incidents while leaving every past record exactly as it was.
