23/01/2012- Steve Gullick

23/01/2012- Steve Gullick Steve Gullick gave us an insight to what the role of a Governor was and how they help in education. What do Governors do? • Governors conduct the school with a view of promoting high standards of educational achievement. • They set appropriate school targets for pupils achievement. • Governors should decide if your school is a uniform school, or a non-uniform school and start and finishing times. • They manage the schools budget. • Every child that attends a school is worth money to the school, the governors are the ones who decide how to spend the money, whether it is on resources or school trips for example. • Most of the money gets spent on the teachers’ salaries and things that the school needs to run such as water and electricity. The rest of the money then gets spent on the pupils. • Governors have to produce a report which has to show the schools results, funding, attendance and where the students and teachers go after school such as after school clubs. • They also have to decided how many teachers the school has, governors interview the staff, and they also regulate staff conduct and discipline. • Governors also draw up an action plan after an inspection has been carried out. Who is the Governing body made up of? • Parents • Teachers • Local education authorities • Staff • Community • Head teacher The governing body is mostly made up of parents, the head teacher has a choice if they want to be a governor or not. Who are the Governors? • Governors should be experts on how a school is run. • Should be people who live local to the school, and want the school to do well. These two points are different views on who should be governors, many people think that the governors play a very big part in the school as they make all the decisions therefore they should be experts. On the other hand you have an opinion that governors should be people who want the school to do well and people who actually care about the school, because they will put more passion into their work and actually want the school to succeed. There are also two other opposite views about governors, them being: • Governors should be paid because It is a very important job. • Governors shouldn’t be paid as it may attract the wrong type of people. These two opinions are very important as they are both very valid points as the role of being a governor is a very important job and people should be paid for it ,however it may attract people who don’t care about the school and just want the money. How do you become a Governor? Governors are elected by the people in the same categories as they want to be in for example, parents are elected by parents and teachers are elected by teachers. However the Local Education Authority governors are elected by the council. How do they do it? Governors must meet once a term and they bring along an agenda of what topics they are going to discuss. Every individual governor has their own Clarke who writes down what is happening so they have notes to reflect back on. What topics will be on the agenda? • Apologies for absence, for governors who couldn’t make it. • Minutes of previous meeting. • Matters arising. • Head teacher’s report. • Report of Finance Committee. • Progress on School Development Plan. • Change of School Uniform. • Report on Governors Conference. • Any other business. • Date and time of next meeting. All of the issues raised in the agenda are very important points for the governors as they help the school to run and progress. There are different governing committees such as finance, health and safety, pupil discipline, staff disciplinary and staff appeals. All of these committees are crucial as a school needs them to be able to run and they have specifically trained governors for each committee. I really enjoyed the lecture with Steve Gullick as I found the topic of governors very appropriate and interesting. And hopefully when I become a teacher, I can also become a governor and have a say in how my school is run.