Steve Gullick

6^th February - Steve Gullick

Steve provided further information on Governing bodies.

Job interviews - Governors do not have to be at job interviews, but usually have 2-5 of them in an interview. Governor’s vote is valued as equal to the Head teacher.

Informal visits to schools - You cannot stop inspectors and governors from going to schools when they want.

Celebrations, e.g. school concerts and productions – Governs will always be at these events, usually sat at the front.

Presentations at governing body meetings – Teachers can be asked to make presentations by the Governing body at the next meeting.

Link governors and their visits – A SENCO will be present at every school and one governor will be a SENCO governor. However there have been questions about this as to how a governor, that is not an expert in SENCO, know if it is adequate? Or know who/what SENCO is?

Staff Disciplinary committee meetings – Governors discipline staff. There are always 3 or 5 governors on the staff disciplinary committee. At the meeting, the teachers are told that they can bring a friend, who is usually someone from their union. There is also a clerk at the meeting who cannot speak but writes down what happens at the meeting, they cannot be a governor however.

Governors are highly concerned with Health and Safety matters. For example overnight school trips involve a working party of 3 governors and 2 teachers to produce a checklist for teachers to go through before they take an overnight trip.

Governors do not deal with the day-to-day aspects of the schools. So for example if a parent complained to a governor that their child rarely brings texts books home to do their homework, then the governor can only ask the parent to ask the teacher as this is something that they don’t have control over.