Education CommitteeWritten evidence submitted by Albert Ede

I have served as a LA Governor at a local Primary school for 15 years the last six as Chair.

We are a very hardworking board and every one of the governors takes a very active role in the management and governance of our school.

Over the period of time that I have served as a Governor I have seen many changes some good some not so good but, in all this time we have stuck to our task.

I do feel however that we have become less appreciated for the work we do by various Education Ministers who seem to forget that we do this purely as volunteers and that many of has hold down a daily job.

I am not necessarily looking for financial gain but a bit more understanding and appreciation of the time and effort that governors give to this task.

We are I believe one of the biggest groups of volunteers in the country and we do this mostly unsung but governments seem to be putting more and more responsibilities onto governing bodies with no reward or recognition of the what we are being asked to contribute.

Our school is in my opinion and Ofsted a good school with outstanding elements at our next inspection we would expect to be rated Outstanding and to have achieved this, the governors will have played a big part but, again we do not seem to be recognised for this.

December 2012