ESC’s school governors plan ‘smoke and mirrors’
Education is facing calls to withdraw a ‘smoke and mirrors’ plan to change how schools in the Bailiwick are governed.
It will seek deputies’ backing next month to make new school governance boards permanent, but it wants to withhold any powers from them until a temporary States committee has investigated what role the boards should play in the future.
A vote in the Assembly held last year indicated majority support for devolving extensive powers to school governors and leaders, and the deputy who led that move has claimed that Education’s latest proposals disguise a desire for the committee and its officials to retain a tight hold over States schools.
‘My real concern is the impact of inertia,’ said Peter Roffey, writing in today’s Guernsey Press.
‘Once those governing bodies are established with limited powers, it will feel like job done. It will be said that we now have local management of schools and the pressure to transform school governance will dissipate.
‘If it is later decided to keep a lot of the power at the centre, that will pretty much fly under the radar. Emasculated governing bodies will be here to stay.’
The Education Committee set up an interim governance board for each States school earlier this term. They include unknown committee members and senior officials from the Education Office and community representatives appointed in recent weeks. Staff and parents’ representatives are due to be appointed in the spring.
Education president Andrea Dudley-Owen has said the boards are playing an increasingly important role in areas of work delegated by the committee and its officials.
But Deputy Roffey feared that making the boards permanent while withholding powers from them would turn them into ‘Aunt Sallies – held accountable for their school’s performance but lacking the real tools to deliver’.
The control and oversight of States schools has been a controversial issue since an external review carried out in 2011 claimed that schools and their children were being let down by outdated centralisation and bureaucracy imposed by the Education Committee and its officials.
Deputy Roffey’s amendment backed by the States in June 2023 called on Education to return to the States as soon as it could with proposals for ‘far greater devolution of powers’ to the proposed school governing boards, including over finances and recruitment. He wants that done before the boards are expanded and made permanent.
Education has claimed that devolving powers to schools too quickly could ‘de-stabilise the education system’ and pointed out that functions such as finance and recruitment fall under a different committee, Policy & Resources.
‘Schools and their performance are just too important to be determined by what is convenient for the political centre,’ said Deputy Roffey.
‘They need to break free of such shackles or this brave new world of devolved governance will just be the old world in disguise.’
Education’s proposals also include removing politicians from school boards, abolishing parochial school committees, which have legal duties relating to property maintenance and pupils’ behaviour, and approving a budget of up to £100,000 to fund the temporary committee’s investigation into the future powers of school boards.
‘This framework will establish structured oversight, clear accountability and increased community involvement in our education settings,’ said Education in its policy letter.
‘Current arrangements, and the legislation underpinning them, do not meet expectations for education governance in the 21st century. These proposals seek to remedy this, and the changes proposed, and the potential benefits they intend to bring, have been fully explored to ensure they are in the best interests of, and have a positive impact on, outcomes for learners.’
