GLOUCESTERSHIRE GOVERNORS' ASSOCIATION

NOTES OF OPEN MEETING ON MONDAY 8 NOVEMBER 2004

The Chairman opened the Meeting and introduced the Head Teachers of Kingswood (Mrs. C. Brodie) and North Nibley (Mrs. B. Freeman) Primary Schools who spoke about The Tyndale Cluster of Primary Schools – an association now consisting of six small Primary Schools in the south of the LEA area originally established by four of these schools in 1998 with the aim of providing high quality education to children within their own community.
Members were advised that the associated schools have developed close working relationships extending to :
 The provision of quality training for Head Teachers, Staff, Governors and Parents;
 Mutual professional support for each other;
 The creation of a forum for professional discussion and development;
 The establishment of a team spirit;
 The provision of value for money through economy of scale; and
 The maintenance of a collaborative and co-operative ethos.
It was explained that cluster Head Teachers :
 Share in the strategic development of the cluster and attend monthly management meetings within the school day;
 Communicate cluster information effectively in school by circulating minutes and by ensuring that cluster information is an item for all Staff and Governor Meetings;
 Give full support to all cluster decisions;
 Communicate cluster information to parents and promote cluster activities;
 Link Cluster Improvement Plans/Targets to individual School Improvements Plans and contribute an equal share to cluster costs from individual school budgets
As to Staff, it was reported that they attend Cluster Inset Days and Staff Meetings and participate in cluster professional development and research while Cluster Governors attend meetings and training sessions and ensure that Job and Person Descriptions include reference to the Cluster and the expected level of commitment from employees.
Past Projects were reported to have included :
 Curriculum development – policies, schemes of work and resourcing;
 Field and other trips and residential projects;
 Art, Sport and Drama activities;
 SENCO development;
 Joint employment of a Cluster Handyman;
 Citizenship curricular development through Independent/State School co-operation.
It was reported that the Cluster is currently working with five clustered schools in the Wiltshire LEA area in a Networked Learning Community Project. In addition, the cluster’s current projects extend to the creation of Classrooms of Excellence
Overall, the clustered schools were reported to have embraced the challenge of change together and to be making use of current research in the analysis of learning styles to further develop the roles and performance of teachers. The schools adopt a collegiate approach in which each school has an equal status and decisions are made by way of consensus; in short, six Head Teachers and six Staff Groups working together are stronger than individual Heads and Teachers working in comparative isolation.
The Head Teachers answered a number of questions and were thanked for their most interesting and professional presentation.
The Chairman then introduced the Assistant Head Teacher of Brockworth Enterprise School “BES” (Mr. Stuart Longworthy) who spoke of Partnerships in Schools with specific reference to the BES arrangements with Primary and Secondary Schools. He quoted a number of examples :
 21 pupils from Castle Hill Primary School in Brockworth had attended a joint Design and Make Day at BES. This had involved designing a maze, entering the design onto computer, printing, costing and marketing. The experience was regarded as very successful;
 Students from BES and from Abbeymead Primary School in Gloucester had worked together for two days to create and put into action music for steel drums;
 There had been a Performing Arts (Development of Drama) Day jointly with Farmors School (Fairford) which had also involved students from Cirencester College and Sir William Romney School (Tetbury);
 Seven students from BES, Archway (Stroud), Pershore and The Croft (Painswick) Schools as Business Studies Trainees had planned together business studies development on an Enterprise Road Show;
 There had been a Conference held at the University of Gloucestershire for Year 12 students from BES, Farmor’s and the High School for Girls (Gloucester) based on a marketing theme. This had attracted sponsorship from Chelsea Building Society. The event had enabled students to meet and work together with complete motivation;
 Recent collaboration with Chosen Hill School (Churchdown) in working with 10 students from each of the schools who had experienced difficulty with their GCSEs and had returned to school for one year to achieve greater success. There had been two Twilight Sessions at BES and it was generally regarded that this was of greater value than would have been so with individual sessions.
It was reported that, for the future, there were plans to further develop linked working between BES, Churchdown and Chosen Hill Schools at secondary level and to extend training collaboration with the University of Gloucestershire and a school in Hong Kong with which BES had links. Generally, the Governors of BES had expressed approval of all outcomes to date.
The Assistant Head Teacher then dealt with a number of questions in which he :
 Said that Enterprise in Education should touch all schools
 Explained that in order to overcome organisational problems, the arrangements for the recent Chosen Hill collaboration had involved use of the BES Minibus and BES Teaching Staff who received appropriate compensatory arrangements; he also said that students who attended the Twilight Sessions were able to take compensatory leave during the ordinary school day;
 BES is looking at the development of distance learning as a further teaching skill.
There were then various observations :
 That there is a form of cluster arrangement as between Winchcombe, Didbrook, Toddington and Oak Hill (Alderton) Primary Schools;
 A number of schools are sharing employment of an IT technician; and
 Focused and effective Governor training is needed particularly in respect of Finance, Ofsted arrangements and Work Force Remodelling. For this purpose, it is appropriate to look to Expert Non-LEA Governor Training schemes which are available. Head Teachers and Governors must decide what clustered schools want to do together and what should be undertaken individually. Certainly there is room for some joint appointments and there are areas where joint Governor expertise (e.g. in respect of Buildings and Premises) can be of great assistance.
In conclusion, prior to the interval, Geoff Black observed that there are already a number of clusters or partnerships some of which may be on their way to becoming Hard Federations which involve the creation of combined Governing Bodies and, generally, one overall Head Teacher.
Arising from discussions between individual governors during the interval, it was recommended that, at future open meetings, representatives should wear labels identifying themselves and their schools; this recommendation was warmly welcomed.
After the Interval, Mrs. Gillian Hayward (Hillesley Church of England Primary) made sundry reports – the first from the Schools Forum. She advised that the Needs Lead Formula Funding Package had met with unanimous approval by members of the Forum; it had been devised for Primary and Secondary Schools and could be regarded as having a radical impact on School Funding. Mrs. Hayward advised that this Formula was now going to the County Council’s Cabinet for formal approval, subject to which there would be a gradual redistribution of funding accompanied by Annual progress reviews commencing in January 2005. Members were advised that a paper relating to further proposed Formula Reform had gone out to Special Schools for consideration, it having been acknowledged that reform for these schools raised a number of complex difficulties. Mrs. Hayward said that the Forum would be giving consideration to funding of schools having split sites and for schools with a high turnover of Traveller children and, in due course, would be considering the financial implications of differing forms of Federation.
In respect of the Fair Funding for Gloucestershire Campaign, Mrs. Hayward advised as to the substantial signature support for the Campaign’s Petition and that representatives of the Campaign Team would be shortly meeting the Schools Minister with the petition in order to explain why it was considered that Gloucestershire LEA was under-funded. Members were also informed that the Campaign Team would be considering closer links with other LEAs in the South West Region who reported similar problems as to funding.
Finally as to the Partnership Board (relative to partnership between the Education and Social Services Departments of the County Council and the Health Service), Mrs. Hayward said that there had been only one meeting and that further developments were awaited.
David Horstead (Dunalley Primary, Cheltenham) as the Governor Representative on the IT Forum reported that he had attended six meetings so far and that there was to be a Special Meeting on 23rd November to discuss LEA budgetary issues for 2004/05
The Chairman spoke as to the proposed GGA Website. She confirmed that costs quotations were being sought and that in addition consideration was being given to the possibility of setting up a separate GGA page in an existing Website instead of creating a separate site. Comment was made as to the volume of information being made available to Governors; it was noted that the GGA could be regarded as a useful filter in order to avoid on-going duplication.
The Chairman advised that the Working Party relative to the County Council’s Review of Primary and Secondary Schools had met on frequent occasions; it was noted that the County Council’s Cabinet was about to make decisions as to the required Consultation structure and processes. One proposal was that in each of the six District Areas within the County there should be local teams of three Governors, one of whom should be a Parent Governor – a total of 18 Governors all of whom should be in a position to commit themselves to this issue over a period of three years.
Geoff Black confirmed that this matter would be considered by the Cabinet on 1st December; Cabinet would determine details and priorities but, at the present time, certain details remained to be resolved. Mr. Black said that the local teams in the six district areas would be regarded as the drivers of the Review Consultation process.
The Chairman reported that Gillian Hayward had available for circulation a Briefing Paper in relation to small primary schools (attached) which had been prepared in relation to the Review exercise.
The Chairman also mentioned the ongoing meetings held by representatives of the GGA with officers of the LEA. In this context there was reference to the question of the LEA Governor Training Scheme. Observations were that there was currently nothing of new interest in the training plans and that some issues required urgent update if these were to be dealt with adequately. There were some subjects for which no training sessions were available and it was sometimes felt that the training advice which was given was inaccurate. For many, the experience was that there was a greater degree of help from contact with the National Governor Helpline Comment was also made as to the occasions when Training sessions were cancelled at short notice.
Anne Bryson (Huntley Church of England Primary) mentioned the assistance to be obtained from published literature and from the national programme of training for Heads and Chairs (see note below)
Leading on from this, there were comments from sundry representatives:
 as to the Governor Meetings with Portfolio Holders; it was said that these followed a pre-arranged agenda and this provided little opportunity for Governors to express their own concerns;
 difficulties which had arisen in respect of revised Primary School Admission arrangements in that some application forms were going direct to the LEA while others were delivered to schools; (see note below)
 the particular difficulty in respect of secondary admissions for pupils attending Willersey Church of England School. As residents of Willersey have a Worcestershire Postal address, the Gloucestershire LEA had wrongly indicated that pupils could not be admitted to Chipping Campden School. It was understood that this problem had now been resolved.
In closing the Meeting, the Chairman mentioned that the GGA remained in need of a Secretary; there was a recommendation that the GGA should consider employing a Clerk on terms similar to those used for the employment of Clerks to School Governors.
The Chairman thanked all who had attended and for all the helpful comments which had been made.
The Meeting closed at 9.05 p.m.

NOTES AS TO CERTAIN ISSUES REFERRED TO ABOVE.

The Book referred to by Anne Bryson is “Policies; a guide for head teachers and school governors” available from Adamsons Books (01353 649238 or on-line @ www.adamsonsbooks.com. There is also a version available with a CD Rom. Anne advises this to be an excellent book, well worth the money.
The new national training programme mentioned by Anne is called “Taking the Chair”; she says that there is also another programme for whole governing bodies. These programmes are said to be being rolled-out through LEAs but, as yet, nothing has been heard about them via Gloucestershire LEA Governor Services. Perhaps if all governors now contact Governor Services for information something will happen.

As to School Admission arrangements comments have been made by Susan Robbins (LEA) as follows:
“Ideally we would still like the primary schools to be able to check off the preference forms but some parents prefer to return these by post. There simply wasn’t time to do this in a co-ordinated way this year but we certainly have it in mind (for the future).”.
As to primary school admissions “once we have all the lists of parents who have registered an interest in them from the schools (and these have just been requested electronically) we can input them onto the system and send a preference form to each parent. There is no change to this system except that it includes the foundation and VA schools. The timetable for primary admissions is attached. All schools have received the document containing this.”

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