Education reveals its school board members
COMMUNITY representatives have been appointed to interim governance boards at all but two schools.
The Education Committee revealed the new school board members at 10 primary schools in Guernsey, St Anne’s in Alderney, all three high schools, two specialist schools, the Sixth Form Centre and The Guernsey Institute. Community representatives were appointed following a recruitment process which started in the summer and culminated in interviews with panels comprising a political member of Education, a head teacher and an official from the Education Office.
‘The committee was delighted with the applications received for the opportunity to be a community representative, which included members of the community who are in roles such as advocates, senior leaders from the private sector, colleagues from the public sector and former school committee members,’ said Education president Andrea Dudley-Owen.
‘There are two schools where a community representative was not appointed. However, it is not unusual for governing boards in England to carry vacancies. While there were applications leading to interviews, no appointments were made in this round of recruitment.’
The two schools which have an interim governance board without a community representative for the time being are Forest, which operates one form in each of the seven years of primary school, and Les Voies, which caters for children aged between nine and 16 with social, emotional or mental health difficulties.
Each school has its own interim governance board, chaired by Deputy Dudley-Owen or her vice-president Deputy Sam Haskins.
‘Alongside a community representative, from the spring term there will be opportunities for a staff representative and a parent representative to join boards,’ said Deputy Dudley-Owen.
The boards also include other members of the Education Committee and senior officials from the Education Office, whose names have not been disclosed, as well as head teachers.
Some boards have representatives of industry and the Economic Development Committee, and the Catholic primary schools’ boards have a representative of the Diocese of Portsmouth.
Schools’ interim governance boards currently have no legal powers or duties, but Education has said they are playing an increasingly important role in areas of work delegated by the committee and its officials.
‘Members are required to have a clear focus on strategic governance and improvement in their role on the interim governance boards,’ said Deputy Dudley-Owen.
‘It is their duty to hold leaders to account for the execution of their delegated functions and management of their setting through informed and robust enquiry in relation to the settings data and reports they have received.
‘These areas include the effectiveness and impact of work to develop vision, values and cultures across a setting, performance, including outcomes for learners, how leaders are using their resources to meet the needs of their learners and staff, and key development priorities for the academic year.’
Education recently submitted proposals which included making school governance boards permanent, removing politicians from them, abolishing parochial school committees, which currently have legal duties relating to property maintenance and pupils’ behaviour, and setting up a temporary States committee to investigate whether school boards should have more powers in the future.
The proposals are likely to be debated by the Assembly next month.
