Education CommitteeWritten evidence submitted by Misbah Arif
Summary/Points of Conclusion
There needs to be clearer and more transparent accountability for governors’ actions, particularly in resolving disputes between staff.
The governing body should make an effort to get to know the wider staff group, not just rely on the opinions and judgments of the Head teacher. A method to do so should thus be enshrined within procedures and practice for governors.
There need to be clear and transparent accountability measures to ensure that parents governors are not just acting on behalf of their own child, as opposed to the student body, and therefore the staff body, as a whole.
Governors should be required to show how their actions are in keeping with legal HR procedures and thereby objective in staff matters.
Governors should be required to show their actions are for the benefit of the school community as a whole. This would include parent and staff governors ensuring that they actively canvas for opinions regularly.
Evidence
1. In an inner city London secondary school I taught in the Head teacher was widely known to be a bully, both within and outside the school. For family reasons, I wished to move and went to talk to him about this. He said that he wanted me to stay and take on more responsibility but I explained that I needed to be nearer my parents’ home. Despite initially then being professional and supportive, he quickly began to bully me. I made a formal grievance compliant in the May, at the same time as tendering my resignation. I had clear evidence within my grievance, including formal school documents.
2. Following my resignation and formal grievance complaint the Head continued to act in a bullying manner, all of which I documented.
3. The chair of governors of the school, who was an employment lawyer, did meet with me regarding my grievance in May but not until the very end of the July by which time the summer term and indeed academic year was nearly over.
4. Following the meeting in July I then had to wait for a response from the Chair of Governors regarding my grievance. In retrospect I know I should have filed a holding grievance at a court back in the summer term, while waiting for the response. However I was not advised about this at the time and was busy looking for another job while working. In fact, the Chair of Governors gave me a distinct lack of information, which in retrospect was—either deliberately or not—to the Head teachers’ benefit. By the time the Chair of Governors did contact me, regarding my grievance in May, it was the autumn term (by which point I was working in another school). It was then that I found it was too late from a legal perspective to take the matter further.
5. The way the Chair of Governors acted, either deliberately or otherwise, meant that my formal grievance complaint was not dealt with as I wished or in fact how it should have been dealt with. It was dealt with in such an inefficient manner by the Chair of Governors that it was rendered a “pointless exercise”. The Head teacher in question had bullied many staff before me and continued to do so after I left.
6. In this instance, there seemed to be no one accounting for how the governing body dealt with the complaint about the Head teacher. I was never made aware of any procedures that were following, the timeframe of procedures or had the chance to meet anyone other than the Chair of Governors.
7. In the meeting regarding my grievance the Chair of Governors told me she had to “trust the word of her head teacher”, and though I can appreciate this is fine in general, this is not an objective stance to take in starting a discussion regarding a formal grievance complaint against the Head teacher.
8. Another comment the Chair of Governors made, in my discussion regarding my grievance, was that she was a parent governor but didn’t know me because I hadn’t taught her son and therefore she could not make a “judgement” about me. I felt this was not relevant, nor is a parent governor in a place to judge a teacher in the conventional sense. The Chair of Governors made no effort to contact members of my department or other staff in the school who had worked with me. In fact I am not aware of anything she did to consider the grievance I presented other than her discussion with me and any discussions she had with the Head teacher (of which, in terms of the latter, I was not aware of or privy to).
9. In other secondary schools I have worked with, in or know of through teaching colleagues; parent governors (along with other “influential” parents) are often listened to above other parents. For example, if a parent governor wishes their child to be moved in to a different class then the move is done, even usually when there is no justifiable reason. This is then not the case in similar requests from other parents. This concerns me as it make the role of parent governor about being about getting the “best” (or what one wants) for ones child, rather than about representing all parents and thereby all children in the school. This also has a potential to bring in a bias from those parents who have the cultural/socioeconomic background to be acting as governors in the first place.
10. This leads to my conclusions regarding this (which are given in the summary):
(a)
(b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
January 2013