Education CommitteeWritten evidence submitted by Patricia Daniels

I have been a school governor for just over 24 years. I have served on all types of school except infant only, and including on an IEB. I spent 14 years as the head of governor services for Medway Council, providing support, advice and training to governors. I also served on national working parties for COGS (Co-ordinators of Governor Services). Now semi-retired, I am a junior school governor and a clerk for a local governing body. I write this in a personal capacity.

I would suggest the following to improve governance:

A clear role for governors, and for governance within Academy chains, with possibly some different arrangements of responsible officers to do the hands on. Within that, a clear expectation from Ofsted, not influenced by the individual inspector.

Compulsory basic training within six months of taking up the role, with updating every year.

A rethink on the emphasis on chairs.

Removal of political influence, with some local accountability for all schools.

Recognition of volunteering.

Proper national funding for schools that is transparent and can be seen to be fair.

1. The current purpose, role and responsibilities of school governing bodies suffers from a lack of clarity and mixed messages. A truly visionary governing body, leading a school onwards and upwards, is a very powerful tool. To then give the body hands on tasks such as hearing exclusion cases, or physically double checking the single central record of staff, makes them part of the back office. This same dichotomy leads to disagreement over the size of governing body needed. Seven may be the current DfE preferred size, but if a governing body has to field two sets of three governors to hear complaints or staffing issues—not including any staff governors—it struggles without some arrangement with the schools nearby. Even some Ofsted inspectors are beginning to suggest that governors should be looking at data for named children, and passing professional judgements.

2. An IEB works because it is focused on a precise task, within a clear timeline. Normal governing bodies have to include their own sustainability, growing the governors of the future. Indeed, school governance is a powerful learning tool within business for the health of the nation’s business leaders. Where else, as a lower or middle manager, do you get the opportunity to work with multi-million pound budgets and hundreds of staff?

3. The current emphasis on chairs is likely to make it more difficult to fill the chair position. Current chairs have suggested that it can easily take a day a week, if not more for a school with problems. Only someone with time to spare can fulfil that type of commitment.

4. The growth of academy chains has totally altered the concept of locally accountable governance. Parent and community governors are both the local face of governance, and in many cases the nursery for future strong governance. A faceless chain, from a distance, has lost that. I exclude from that the excellent local chains that do exist, where the local strong governance is nurturing communities for schools.

The current expansion of Academies has unfortunately followed some of the outcomes of Grant Maintained schools, when an entire large department of the DfE was required to duplicate the role then undertaken by Local Authorities.

5. Most governors would not want remuneration. However, recognition as volunteers, even though they do not fit the current straightjacket of volunteering for two hours every week, would be beneficial and open up recruitment.

6. The difficulties of managing finances when the funding formulae are complex and changing cannot be underestimated. The inequalities are great, not just between areas, but between schools. Why should a child be worth 50 % more in a secondary school than a primary school? It does not need a bank manager or accountant on the governing body to know that reasonably stable funding means planning ahead can happen; important in a profession where it is difficult to manage and comply with timetables for reducing staffing.

January 2013