Schools, preschools, children’s services, and other education and care settings are places where all community members should expect to feel safe and treated with respect.

Most visitors, including parents and carers, are respectful while visiting education and care sites and interacting with staff. However, a minority of visitors sometimes do not follow expectations for safe and appropriate behaviour. When this happens, it can cause significant distress to other members of the education and care community or unnecessarily disrupt their ability to work and learn.

In 2025, the Parliament of South Australia passed the Education and Children's Services (Barring Notices and Other Protections) Amendment Act 2025 to improve and strengthen the protective powers available to leaders at education and care sites to manage risks posed to their communities from visitors.

This page includes supporting information, templates and resources, including the Ministerial Guidelines and Supplementary Guidance, to support education staff in making fair, proportional, and consistent decisions about issuing barring notices.

Education staff at government sites can find further information on EDi (login required).

Who can issue a barring notice

Both government and non-government education and care sites in South Australia can use a range of protective measures to manage risks to their site community from unsafe or unacceptable behaviour from visitors, including parents or other community members:

• schools
• preschools
• children’s services centres
• other approved services under the Education and Care Services National Law (such as long day care and out of school hours care)
• all other Department for Education sites (such as learning and behaviour centres, intensive English language centres, local education offices, and corporate offices)
• any other premises prescribed by regulations.

Who can be issued with a barring notice

A person who is neither employed at the relevant premises nor a child/student attending the site is considered a visitor and may be issued with a notice or protective measure. Visitors can include:

• parents of children/students attending the site
• other family members or friends
• volunteers
• governing council or board members
• other people performing duties at the premises (e.g. allied health service providers, trades, couriers, waste collection, etc)
• other members of the local community.

A visitor is a genuine visitor if they have a legitimate reason to be on the site premises at the time they are there; for example, to collect their child or attend an appointment. A visitor is a trespasser if they do not have a reasonable excuse to be on the premises at a given time. A genuine visitor could become a trespasser if they fail to leave when directed by site staff.

Supporting resources and information

The Ministerial Guidelines: Barring notices under the Education and Children’s Services Act 2019 (PDF 371 KB) are published in line with section 93(5) of the Education and Children’s Services Act 2019 as amended by the Education and Children’s Services Act (Barring Notices and Other Protections) Amendment Act 2025 (Amending Act).

The supplementary guidance (PDF 577 KB) complements the instructions in the Ministerial Guidelines and provides guiding recommendations and practical advice to support education staff to manage behavioural risks to their site community.

Sites and designated persons should read and use both the Ministerial Guidelines and Supplementary Guidance when determining the appropriate approach at their site.

The following templates are available for use by all government and non-government site leaders:

• notification of proposal to issue a barring notice (DOCX 29 KB)
• barring notice (DOCX 55 KB)
• application for a barring notice to be changed or withdrawn (PDF 233 KB) (this must be enclosed when issuing a barring notice)
• authorisation form (DOCX 24 KB) .