Examination of Witnesses (Questions 231-239)
DAVID BUTLER,
CLARE COLLINS
AND DEBORAH
ISHIHARA
29 APRIL 2009
Q231 Chairman: I welcome Deborah
Ishihara and Clare Collins to our deliberations. David Butler
will join us imminently. You heard my introduction when I said
that we are very grateful for your help in the inquiry. You represent
two sectors that are most important to us. I hope that you will
bear with us in the sense that we are trying to cram a quart into
a pint pot, so we are going to bombard you with questions. We
are looking at the accountability of the education system. We
are where we are. You heard what the other people said in the
previous session. Do we need change, Deborah?
Deborah Ishihara: Do we need change
to what is presented to parents? Yes, in that sense, we do. In
our view, there is not enough emphasis on compliance. Education
attainment seems to be the main criterion at the moment. That
doesn't give enough information to parents. We get calls every
day about all sorts of other issues, such as bullying, exclusions,
SEN and so forth. We hear from parents that they need more information
of different sorts. What they are really interested in is whether
their children will be happy at a school and whether they will
be supported at a school. The information that they have to hand
doesn't really address some of those issues.
Clare Collins: Do we need change?
Q232 Chairman: Are we happy
with the system as it is?
Clare Collins: No, we need an
incremental change. We need to strengthen it. I represent school
governing bodies. It is absolutely crucial that we clarify the
role of the governing body as an accountable body for schools.
If we do that and strengthen governance, we will strengthen accountability,
and that will be a good thing for schools.
Q233 Chairman: It is interesting
that, in the previous evidence session, they hardly mentioned
governing bodies.
Clare Collins: It is not just
interesting, it is quite worrying. Not only did they not mention
governing bodies very much—
Chairman: Welcome, David Butler.
David Butler: Thank you, Chairman.
Clare Collins: Doing my homework,
as I obviously did for this, I read the other submissions. There
was a huge number of pages of dense text, with no mention of the
governing body.
Chairman: Thank you for that. David,
are you getting your breath?
David Butler: I am, yes. I have
just run up from Black Rod's. Thank you very much, Chairman.
Q234 Chairman: Do we need
an inquiry? Do we need to write a report on this or is everything
in the garden lovely?
David Butler: No. Several things
could be said about this. I welcome the opportunity to present
evidence to the Committee. We have sent in a written submission.
I only finished it last night at the office, but you may have
got it this morning.
Chairman: David, we have got it. Don't
worry about it—don't repeat it.
David Butler: Fine. I am really
happy to take any questions on it or any additional questions
that you might have.
Chairman: That is what we have got you
here for.
Q235 Mr Stuart: Governing
bodies are supposed to hold the head teacher to account for the
school's performance, so should we have all the multiple layers
of other levels of accountability? Is that confusing the situation
and stopping a more effective accountable system that is based
on governors?
Clare Collins: We agree that we
have multiple accountability, but it needs clarifying. We have
other aspects of the system. If it was made clear that they fed
their information to the governing body, that would bring a focus
to the role of the governing body, which would mean that you could
streamline accountability and make it more effective. Listening
to the last submissions was very interesting. Ofsted and the school
improvement partners programme role are vital in looking at different
levels of information, with people coming in with different expertise.
That builds a picture so that you can ascertain whether the school
is providing a good basis for the children's learning and whether
they are making progress.
Q236 Mr Stuart: Deborah, is
a good and effective governing body regarded as a peculiar bonus,
rather than as something that can be taken for granted? Are all
these other structures in place because no one relies on governing
bodies to do their job?
Deborah Ishihara: I would not
say no one relies on governing bodies. It is very useful when
you have a good, independent check and balance on the school through
the governing body. That does not always happen, but we advise
parents daily that if they have a problem with the school, they
can go and talk to the school, but if that has no effect, they
can go to the governing body and ask it to act as a check and
balance on what has happened. We strongly support the role of
governors in terms of accountability. In our submission, if we
talk about schools, we are really talking about the governing
body and its role as a check and balance on the school, and we
very much support governing bodies.
Q237 Mr Stuart: Do you think
that governing bodies are effective, David? In particular, do
they fulfil their role of putting out tentacles into the local
community, genuinely grounding the school and making every school
a community school? Are they working?
David Butler: In the main, governing
bodies are working. Clearly, like anything else, you have examples
of really excellent practice, but you also have examples of practice
that is not so excellent. In regard to the line of questioning
that we are having at the moment, I would say that our research,
which was probably submitted to you just this morning, suggests
that parents are interested in public accountability. There is
also evidence from our research that they would like to see some,
let us say, cross-comparators—in other words, some form
of national basis on which they can examine schools and make sure
that things are accountable. That would predicate in favour of
something that is beyond the governing body. The governing body
can do an excellent job locally, but if you want to go beyond
that, you may need something else.
Q238 Mr Stuart: In practical
terms, what can governing bodies do to improve school performance?
Clare?
Chairman: Clare, can you reposition yourself
slightly in front of the microphone, because your voice is not
coming over quite so strongly. Remember, those microphones were
used by Gladstone.
Clare Collins: Sorry, are we talking
about what governing bodies can do to hold schools to account?
Mr Stuart: To improve school performance.
Clare Collins: In terms of improving
school performance, the governing body is there to challenge,
focus and use the information that is available to it. It is there
to influence and, in terms of putting out tentacles into the community,
it can perhaps broker support between the school and the local
authority or whatever to make sure that the school has what it
needs to do the job that it is supposed to be doing.
Q239 Mr Stuart: With the previous
panel, I described two levels of accountability. One was about
the institution—the school—and involved leadership,
the ethos and planning for a rich learning experience. There is
also the individual teaching quality. Is the governing body equally
effective at ensuring that we have a high-quality institution
and at challenging poor teaching so that we have high-quality
teaching?
Clare Collins: There are about
three levels to that question. First, in terms of understanding
what happens with the institution, the governing body has what
it needs, with everything else that is coming in. Governing bodies
should get reports regularly—at least termly—on the
quality of teaching in the school. What the governing body does
in response to that to make sure that the school follows through
is problematic, and there are real issues about responding to
poor teaching and about what is out there to help you deal with
that. Risk-averse local authority HR departments can make things
difficult, and that is extremely frustrating for governing bodies
when they are sitting there saying, "This teacher is still
performing poorly. We are still looking at yet another intervention.
We want something to happen."
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