Governers

CAULDWELL LOWER SCHOOL GOVERNING BODY

The Role of the Governing Body

Governors are like a Board of Directors and make decisions about how the school is run. They meet at least twice a term at school.

Governors are appointed to help:

Decide what is taught

Set standards of behaviour

Interview and select staff

Decide on how the school budget is spent

Support the Headteacher and staff

School governors have legal duties, powers and responsibilities. They can only act together.

School governors are:

Parents

Teachers at the school

Local Education Authority representatives

Community representatives, businessmen and women (co-opted governors)

Parent Governors:

Have a child in the school

Are elected by the parents of the school

Serve, as do other governors, for four years

Parent governors are on the governing body as they bring the views of parents, but speak and act as individuals. They have equal status and voting rights.

Parent governors can be expected to make sure that all communications with parents are both informative and jargon-free. Parent governors should be aware of ways to encourage parent interest in the school.

You as a parent elect three parent governors for a period of four years.

The minutes of the Governing Body meetings are available in the school office for reading.

Performance Management is the name given to the system that schools use to ensure that staff get a fair chance to help the children to their best. The governors are involved in Mrs Apps performance management; other members of staff discuss their targets and training needs with their team leaders.

Mrs Apps had the same external advisor who had helped us set her targets last academic year; we reviewed them and set new ones in the Autumn term. The 2002/03 targets were to implement our post-Ofsted Action Plan in relation to EAL staff, to extend gifted and talented provision in Maths and to implement and monitor the new SEN Code in our school. The external advisor was very impressed with Mrs Apps performance, action had been taken to achieve all of the targets and one had gone far beyond the target set. The new targets involved preparing staff and governors for Cauldwell's next Ofsted inspection, whenever that may be, to tighten up the assessment process used for tracking pupil progress and to take the school into the Excellence Cluster when the EAZ stops at the end of 2004.

Staff took part in Investors in Excellence training during the Autumn term and this has fed into the style of target setting the school uses for performance management.

Mrs Apps has trained as a facilitator for IIE. Mrs Crombie and Mrs Mills attended Investors in People workshops in the spring term. Other staff have been on a variety of courses or have been offered sessions on ICT, English and SEN. The school has benefited from the support of Numeracy and Literacy consultants during the year. Staff have visited other schools in the EAZ to share ideas and good practice. The school is also continuing to act as a training school supporting trainee teachers and child-care students.