Money can't buy you Govs

School governors don't always get a good press. Ofsted head honcho Sir Michael Wilshaw recently complained, "In the worst cases, governors can be rather like the jury that was dismissed from a high-profile trial the other week: ill-informed and not able to make good decisions." Nice. Thanks for that, Sir Michael. The Chief Inspector of Schools floated the idea that paying governors might be one way of raising standards of school governance, a suggestion rejected by the National Governors' Association.

Professionalising governance may be more of a hindrance than a help. The fact that governors have nothing to lose financially and career-wise can give them the courage they need to hold senior leaders to account. Currently they don't have to worry that rocking the boat might deprive them of a nice little earner. 

But amateur doesn't have to mean amateurish. Most governors volunteer for the role to try and make a difference in the life of their local school and take governance seriously  Some have a background in education, others, like me, do not. When the latter is the case, newly appointed governors will find themselves on a steep learning curve. They'll sometimes feel that they are drowning in an Alphabetti Sphagetti of acronyms; CPD, ECM, TLR, SLT, BANG. I made the last one up. It means 'Baffled by Acronyms New Governor'. But as you get stuck in things slowly begin to make sense. Attending training courses helps to further clarify matters. 

Being a governor is a challenging and rewarding task. Hands-on governance takes time and won't make you any richer, but there are rewards that can't be measured in pounds, shillings and pence. Playing a part in helping to create a school where every student matters and all are able to achieve their full educational potential is one of them. 

Have a great half term break!

The Perfect (Ofsted) School Governor by Tim Bartlett

Independent Thinking Press, 2013, Print Length, 217pp, Kindle e-book

No, I'm not commending my authorised biography. Hardly. Rather, this book is meant to tell us how to become a Perfect (Ofsted) School Governor. At least that's the idea. I suppose there's no harm in aiming high, but Perfect? Even Ofsted are only after Outstanding at best. Enough quibbling about the title, though. Perfection in governance might be asking a bit much, but following the advice contained in this book will certainly help governing bodies to do their job more effectively.

The book has six chapters:

1. Strategic leadership and how governors provide it
2. Good governance: the importance of self-evaluation and effective policies
3. Governor visits to the school
4. Holding the head teacher and the leadership team to account
5. Oftsed: inspections and governors
6. Appointing a new head teacher

And no less than eleven appendices. I'm not going to list them here. You can check out the book's 'Click to LOOK INSIDE' thing on Amazon if you're interested.

I wish I had read this book when I was first thinking about becoming a governor, or at least when I had just joined the governing body. It would have helped me to hit the ground running. Well, at least walking purposefully rather than wandering around looking a bit bewildered. The book explains the essentials of governance and suggests ways in which things can be done better for the good of the school.

As a new governor I often found it hard to see the wood for the trees. I suddenly found myself in an educational forest that was so densely populated with jargon-laden information that it was difficult to get a sense of perspective. To that end the book includes some useful jargon and acronym busting. Key concepts such as strategic leadership and accountability simply defined. Illustrations are given of how they work out in practice. You won't find all that you'll need to know here, but this systematic overview will bring a welcome clarity to the thinking of the most befuddled new gov.

There are lots of handy tips here on improving governance that I plan to try out on our Governing Body over the coming months. We especially need to do some work on self-evaluation, seeking feedback from governors on the usefulness or otherwise of our various meetings.

Not that I'll be implementing all of the author's suggestions. Having our longsuffering Clerk read out her minutes for governors' approval at the end of every agenda item would slow the pace of meetings unnecessary. Yes, the Chair may sometimes wish to check that a precisely worded statement has been accurately minuted. But usually the gist of what was said is sufficient and the record can be approved at the next meeting.

I'd certainly urge that all wannabe and newbie governors have a read of this book. Battle scarred veterans of many a Full Governing Body meeting might learn a thing or two as well. In addition, it wouldn't hurt for the Senior and Middle Leaders who attend our sessions so we can subject them to Paxmanesque interrogation to give the book a once over so they can familiarise themselves with the principles and processes of school governance.

To return to the book's somewhat misleading title, I doubt whether our or anyone else's governing body will ever achieve an idealised state of Platonic perfection, but that doesn't mean that we can't improve our practice. Governors expect the school they serve to be constantly making progress. As agents of reform, governing bodies need to be perpetually reforming themselves. Perfect? Never. Better? Absolutely. But then, had the title been, The Better (Oftsted) Governor, it probably wouldn't have caught my attention when browsing for something governory to read on Amazon.

A hardback edition is available for any without a newfangled e-reader device (see here).

Highly recommended.

So, what’s a Guv’nor then, mister?

Two episodes.

Episode One. I was sitting in on a RE lesson. Before the teacher got started a student asked what I was doing in the class. ‘I’m a governor.’ I replied. ‘What’s one of those?’ asked the child. Well, I’d only just become a governor and didn’t quite know how to explain to a Year 8 pupil exactly what it meant to be a member of the school’s governing body. I mumbled something about us appointing the Head Teacher and making sure that things get better in the school and that was about it. The student didn’t look entirely satisfied. I tried.

Episode Two. Mr. Ofsted was in the building. I, together with other governors had to meet him. Scary. Wearing a suit, shirt and tie and with my governor’s ‘blue lanyard of power’ around my neck I strode purposefully down the corridor. A small child approached me. Year 7, I guess. He looked up at me with big pleading eyes, a bit like Puss in Boots from the Shrek films. ‘Please sir’ he said, proffering what looked like a tin full of cookery ingredients, ‘do you know where I should put this?’ Maybe I had the look of someone who might. But I didn’t and told him that I was a governor, not a teacher and directed him to a nearby member of staff. The poor lad looked crestfallen and rather confused, as if to say, ‘What’s the point in those governors if they don’t even know where I should put my cookery things?’

Epilogue. With Mr. Oftsed waiting I didn’t have time to explain that where the cookery stuff goes is an operational matter and the job of governors is to provide the school with strategic leadership. If you like, the governing body punches the coordinates into the educational SatNav, setting the overall direction of the school. Then the head and senior leaders collectively get behind the wheel, put their foot on the gas and make sure we get there. Along the way Governors hold leaders to account to ensure that the school isn’t going off track. That, in essence is what we do. Kind of. In case you were wondering.