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Overview
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781781350959 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Independent Thinking Press |
| Publication date: | 07/31/2013 |
| Series: | Perfect Series |
| Sold by: | Bookwire |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 216 |
| File size: | 399 KB |
About the Author
Jackie Beere MBA OBE worked as a newspaper journalist before starting a career in teaching and school leadership. She was awarded the OBE in 2002 for developing innovative learning programmes. Since 2006 she has been offering training in the latest strategies for learning, developing emotionally intelligent leadership and growth mindsets. She is the author of several bestselling books on teaching, learning and coaching, as well as being a qualified Master Practitioner in NLP.
Read an Excerpt
Foreword by Jackie Beere
It has never been more important to attract as governors people who can add value to schools. Having worked as a governor myself, and worked with governors as a head teacher, I know that they can be a support or an irritation, an inspiration or an obstacle to the success of a school. Governors need to rise above the everyday concerns and ask the big questions about strategy and results. They need to be confident enough to raise issues with the head teacher and to engage with staff and children during school contact time. They need to know how to work as a team of professionals who believe in a set of shared values that will deliver the shared vision for a successful school. All of this, for no financial reward – as yet – and a huge quantity of paperwork and
procedures to wade through at every meeting. Make no mistake, this is a demanding role, but also an immensely satisfying contribution to any community.
Some governors will come to their first meeting having no more knowledge of the world of education than their own schooling and perhaps the gossip from the school gate or horror stories from their children. How empowering to have the chance to see beyond this into the complex world of school improvement! Governors begin to realise how staffing decisions are made, school budgets are spent and feel the pressure of school accountability when Ofsted arrives.
The days of governors meeting once or twice a term and making the occasional appearance at the school show are over. Now governors are held responsible, as part of the school leadership, during inspection. They are expected to know how well the school is performing and show that they know what is being done to improve it. This requires governors to be able to observe lessons, understand complex performance data and contribute to school development plans.
Governors give their time, their expertise and, crucially, a different perspective to the challenges schools face, ensuring, together with the school leadership, that our schools work hard for every child. In many areas, local authorities no longer play a central role in monitoring and improving schools and academies, so it is even more important that governance can provide the support and challenge that delivers a high quality education. This is a huge expectation and a learning journey for everyone who joins a governing body.
Governors who have an open mind, a mission to understand and who are open to learn are the very best assets that a head teacher can have to help deliver outstanding outcomes for children.
What governors need in order to do all this successfully is a practical, readable, handy guide with all the crucial information to hand, which they can dip into and learn from as needed. Tim, with all his wealth of experience to draw upon, has produced that guide in this little book. Its strengths are in its attention to detail, readability and useful resources – and in the confidence it will give governors to do a brilliant job for their school community.
Jackie Beere, Tiffield
Table of Contents
Acknowledgements
Foreword
Introduction: Quick-start guide
1. Strategic leadership and how governors provide it
2. Good governance: the importance of self-evaluation and effective policies
3. Governor visits to the school
4. Holding the head teacher and leadership team to account
5. Ofsted: inspections and governors
6. Appointing a new head teacher
Appendix 1: Becoming a school governor .
Appendix 2: A history of education in England and Wales
Appendix 3: Meeting record
Appendix 4: Meeting evaluation checklist
Appendix 5: Twenty questions for a school governing body to ask itself
Appendix 6: Example lesson visit checklist
Appendix 7: Example learning walk record form .
Appendix 8: Head teacher’s report: suggested headings
Appendix 9: Head teacher person specification
Appendix 10: Head teacher job description
Appendix 11: Glossary
Endnotes
Bibliography and further reading
A word of thanks
Index