Navigating Legal Exposure in a Changing Environment & Implementing Best Practice
| Date | 20 May 2026 |
| Time | 11.00am-4.00pm AEST (Syd/Mel/Bris time) |
| Venue | Live Online with recording available (recording expires 20 June 2026) |
| Pricing | $440 Prices includes gst. |
| CPD | Addresses 7.2 of the Australian Professional Standards for Teachers |
| Other related LawSense Events | See other LawSense Events |
11.00 LawSense Welcome
11.05 Chairperson’s Introduction
Shaun Nodwell, Director of Sport, St Peters Lutheran College (Queensland)
Adam Raw, Director of Sport, Pymble Ladies’ College (NSW)
11.10 Effectively Managing External Providers, Contractors, and Volunteers: Due Diligence, Risk Assessment, Psychosocial Hazards, Supervision, Contracts, Waivers and Indemnities
Assessing and Managing External Providers and Contractors
- Understanding your obligations to assess the relevant skills, experience or fitness of external providers or contractors
- What information should you request or obtain about staff of external providers?
- Examining the extent to which you are required to supervise where external providers are involved
- Do you have to develop your own risk assessment for the activity, or can you rely on the risk assessment of the external provider?
Psychosocial Safety and Arrangements with External Providers
- Understanding psychosocial hazards laws and increased expectations and how these apply in school sport
- Applying psychosocial hazards laws in dealing with external providers, including:
- Understanding the school’s liability regarding psychosocial hazards where external providers or contractors are used
- identifying psychosocial hazards for students and coaches
- examining policies and practices of external providers/contractors regarding psychosocial hazards and updating contracts
Waivers, Disclaimers, and Indemnities Requested by External Providers
- Outlining the types of waivers, disclaimers and indemnities external providers typically request
- Understanding the potential legal and insurance implications for the school
- Dealing with waivers, disclaimers and indemnities in practice, to optimise the school’s position
Managing Obligations with Volunteers/Parents
- Understanding your rights and obligations when parents or other volunteers are involved, including current child safety obligations and working with children checks
- Determining appropriate tasks and supervision
Leighton Hawkes, Principal, McCabes Lawyers
Tim McDonald, Principal, McCabes Lawyers
12.10 Break
12.20 School Concussion Policies Panel: Examining What Schools Have Implemented and Exploring Best Practice
Legal Obligations and Available Guidelines – Return to Sport and Return to School
- Examining the current state of evidence and notable recent court proceedings regarding concussion in sport
- Outlining current obligations and available guidelines regarding concussion in school sport
- Understanding the current approach of WHS regulators to school sport injuries, including when the regulators are “activated” and what they look for
- Understanding the nature and extent of medical evidence you should require to allow return to play or return to school, including where the return is proposed contrary to guidelines
Exploring Key Aspects of Best Practice Policies
- Exploring key aspects of best practice concussion policies, including:
- Implementing sports concussion policies as part of a broader concussion policy
- should you implement different policies depending on the sport and gender
- what guidelines should be adopted
- managing and monitoring concussion at games
- obtaining and optimising medical evidence
- optimising information to the school, including regarding relevant injuries outside school sport
School Concussion Policy Case Studies
- Examining what concussion policies schools have implemented and learnings
Lawyer and Facilitator:
Dr David Maddocks, Partner, Perry Maddocks Trollope Lawyers; Board Director, Cricket Australia; Former Neuropsychologist
Schools:
Sonia Berry, Executive Officer, Independent Girls’ Schools Association NSW (IGSA NSW)
Sean Allcock, Director of Haileybury Sport, Haileybury (Victoria)
Cam Anderson, Head of Co-Curricular, St Ignatius’ College, Riverview (NSW)
1.40 Break
1.50 Navigating Information Collection, Disclosure and Sharing, Including Requests from Regulators, Health Information, Performance Data, Injury Records, Photos and Social Media
Types of Data Collected and Outlining Applicable Privacy Laws
- Exploring the different types of data collected, used and shared by schools for school sport
- Outlining key laws applying, including privacy, confidentiality and information sharing
Sharing Information with External Providers
- Understanding rights and obligations in providing student information to external providers – when can/should this be shared
- Examining obligations in protecting information provided to external providers:
- assessing risks of data and privacy breaches involving external suppliers
- what should you require of the external provider regarding data management, security and sharing?
- clauses to include in the contract with the external supplier
Using Software Applications
- Assessing software applications regarding privacy – key issues to consider
Photos, Video and Social Media
- Applying legal obligations to photos/videos, including privacy laws and new social media age limits
- Understanding obligations and options regarding photos taken by parents or people outside of the school community
Concussion and Injury Records and Requests from WHS Regulators
- Exploring circumstances where records could be requested by WHS regulators
- Providing information to WHS regulators:
- understanding your obligations and implications regarding your legal exposure
- navigating privacy obligations to students and parents
- evaluating when and when not to provide information to WHS regulators
Best Practice Data Collection and Management, Including Consent Forms
- Examining best practice consent forms/clauses to manage data from school sport including health conditions, concussion and injury data, performance data and records, photos and video
- Implementing best practice data collection, sharing and management policies for school sport
Steven Troeth, Partner, Gadens
2.50 Break
3.00 Case Studies and Best Practice: Navigating Current Challenges with Domestic and Overseas Tours
Navigating Particular Challenges
- Navigating particular challenges with domestic and overseas tours, including:
- selection criteria and managing parent complaints
- determining minimum and optimum staff/student/volunteer ratios and skills mix
- ensuring proper collection, management and sharing of relevant health information of students and staff
- managing the involvement of volunteers
- assessing and managing particular hazards for staff, including psychosocial hazards
- examining the viability of different accommodation arrangements
- evaluating first aid and medical requirements, including staff or medical professionals
- travelling with student medication, including controlled drugs
Staff Pay
- Determining staff hours on a domestic or overseas trip – what time can reasonably be claimed as time at work
- Understanding pay obligations, including possible obligations to pay overtime at an hourly rate
- Exploring options to optimise staff pay arrangements to maintain the financial viability of domestic and overseas tours
David Scanlan, Employment Law Lead – WA, Mapien Law; Former, Director of People and Culture, St Hilda’s Anglican School for Girls
3.55 Chairperson’s Conclusion
4.00 Event Close
Presenters / panelists include:
For the past 10 years, Shaun Nodwell has been the Director of Sport at St Peters Lutheran College. St Peters has one of the largest co-educational sporting programs in the country. This program is a P-12 Sporting Program involving of 3000 students across two Brisbane Campuses. Shaun has overseen the St Peters Swimming Program, which is the most successful program in Australia and has recently been described as the strongest school swimming program in the world. He has regularly organised and facilitated many internal and external carnivals, both domestic and international sporting tours.
Leighton Hawkes commenced his career in claims management and other technical roles with a major Australian insurance. Leighton has acted for the NSW Department of Education for a large number of years. Presently he acts in a diverse range of matters, including claims arising from public liability, property damage to NSW schools, historical sexual abuse, discrimination (employee and disability), and Coronial enquiries.
Tim McDonald leads the national workplace practice at Moray & Agnew Lawyers, practising in employment and industrial law, work health and safety, discrimination, bullying and harassment, management of injured workers and termination of employment. Over the last 20 years, Tim has advised and represented employers, from a broad range of industries, including education
David Maddocks has many years of experience dealing with issues relevant to schools. He has acted for schools in major legal cases, including Royal Commissions, Coronial Inquests and personal injury claims. Aside from acting for schools, David also works in sports law and acts for doctors. He has provided legal advice to the AFL and the AFL Doctors Association and was involved as a lawyer in the AFL - Essendon Football Club supplements matter. David is also a former Chairman of Cricket Victoria. Prior to law, David worked as a Neuropsychologist. He has conducted internationally recognized research into the diagnosis and recovery from concussion in sport. Aspects of this research have been adopted by the IOC, FIFA and American NFL.
Cam Anderson is Head of Sport at Barker College. Cam worked across several sectors in a number of Schools prior to accepting the role of Director of Sport roles. During his 15-year tenure at Pymble, Cam was responsible for all programs outside of the classroom setting including Performing Arts, Language Arts and Sport. He recently moved to Barker College where he is responsible for the Pre-K to Yr. 12 sports program. Cam enjoys working in a strategic capacity and is thoroughly enjoying his time at Barker College.
Sean Allcock is an educator with 25 plus years’ experience. During his journey he has been fortunate to have taught at all levels of the school. Throughout his career he has undertaken of variety roles which included Curriculum Development, Administration and Pastoral Care, Staff Performance Management and is currently the Director of Sport at Haileybury College
Sonia Berry joined IGSA as the Executive Officer in 2016. Sonia is a lawyer, mediator and consultant who has worked within the school sector for over 25 years. She has a passion for the education of girls.
Steven Troeth has extensive experience in the education sector, including acting for independent and Catholic schools. He advises on employment, student and parent issues, including staff and teacher disputes, discrimination, bullying, cyber and social media issues, enterprise agreements and contractual disputes.
David Scanlan is currently a Senior Employment Lawyer at Mapien Law heading up their WA office, having commenced in September 2025. Prior, David was the Director of People & Culture at St Hilda’s from 2020. In this role he drove the people development, cultural development, talent acquisition and compliance functions of the School.