Governor Services

MINUTES OF THE HAVANT PATCH FORUM MEETING

held at the

DAME JUDITH PROFESSIONAL CENTRE PORTSMOUTH

Date: Thursday 14th October 2004

Present: 21 Governors (See attached list)

Apologies:

Chair: Mrs Sylvia Vine

Clerk Mr Richard Cope

Guest Speaker: Mr Richard Mitchell

Strategic School Improvement Manager ( SSIM )

1. Apologies for absence

  • Janet Coates-Jones The Hayling School

  • Frances Moon St. Thomas More's Catholic Primary

  • Vernon Petherick Crookhorn Comm

  • Oaklands School

  • Penny Whitte Trosnant Infants

  • Mrs. Funnell Staunton Park

  • Steve Waller Horndean Technical College

The Chair welcome the representatives and made the appropriate introductions. Richard Mitchell was thanked for coming to the meeting and being our guest speaker.

Chair's Note - With the agreement of the floor, the presentation from Richard Mitchell ( Item 4 of the agenda ) was given PRIOR to Items 2 and 3.

2. Minutes of the last meeting

The minutes of the meeting of 20th. May 2004 were agreed as being a true and accurate record and were duly signed.

3. Matters Arising

  • No further feedback re. school meals

  • The issue of Transitional Support Grant was raised again. DFES issued strict guidelines as to how the money should be spent. Hampshire tried to spread money across as many schools as possible. The allocation, however, had to be agreed and approved by the DFES. The transitional support grant monies are to be halved this year. Monies will be channelled towards behaviour intervention, school improvement, workforce reform (especially at the Primary School level), financial training and consultancy.

  • Drinking water in Secondary Schools. This matter was raised but no specific LEA guidance is available on this matter. Schools decide on their policy as to whether children can bring bottled water into classes and drink it. Dangers exist with water and electrical equipment and also with water and certain chemicals/substances which may be present in a science laboratory. The School's Health and Safety policy and regime etc. should specify "Do's and Don'ts" at the specific school level. Generally, water fountains are provided in the playground for the use of secondary pupils.

4. Items from the Floor

OVERVIEW OF SSIM ROLE

Copies of Richard's presentation were handed out to attendees. A short précis of some of the interesting and salient facts of his presentation are given below -

  • Organisation changes over the last few years have resulted in the education department becoming much more specialised.

  • Richard went through the core roles of the LEA and included Leadership and School Improvement

  • The emphasis is now on the needs of young people, and this encompasses more than just education.

  • School improvement is there to support Heads, Governors, Teachers etc. Its role is to monitor the performance of ALL schools and to challenge.

  • HCC has a strategy for education and a vision statement involving "Maximising life opportunities through education". The vision statement is aspirational.

  • The Children's Bill currently going through Parliament accords well with our Vision statement, with an emphasis on "Enjoyment AND Achievement".

  • The Education department is to be re-organised in January 2005 into 4 branches and aims to foster a "love for learning".

  • The SSIM of each region is a member of the branch management team and is responsible for the education and welfare of 65,000 children in 183 schools.

  • SSIM and 3 School Improvement Managers ( SIM's ) in the South East cover 24 secondary schools and 149 Primary Schools.

  • A major task is to decide priorities. A school monitoring panel is set up and a termly report is presented on schools that are giving concerns. A budget is available which allows the SSIM to deploy inspectors and consultants into schools.

  • One of the SSIM's tasks is to ensure consistency. The team also plays a lead role in the appointment of New Heads. This is an important role and their help has received positive feedback from Governors.

  • School Monitoring is done via Attached Inspectors and Consultants. Specialist inspectors exist at the Primary and Secondary School level and also for Special Schools. The Secondary School Inspectors are likely to be replaced by School Improvement Partners in the future as part of the New Relationship with Schools initiative, potentially w.e.f. Jan 2006.

  • Greater emphasis is now given to the schools own self-evaluation.

  • The `School Profile' is being developed to replace the Governors Annual report to parents. This profile will be pre-populated by the DFES.

  • The school improvement partner is involved in setting Head Teacher's Objectives etc.

  • A Hampshire document entitled "Supporting High Standards In Hampshire" is to be published shortly.

  • Governors and Schools need to ensure that they have a proper evidence-base to support the schools various self-evaluations.

  • The presentation sparked off a lively and interesting discussion on the various aspects of School Improvement that were of interest to the Governors.

  • Questions -

  • What is Hampshire's Vision? Governors need access to this vision statement. Can it please be published?

  • Does the vision include standards of teaching and buildings? Yes

  • One of the schools takes on pupils from a disadvantaged area. Its intake was going down. As the standards improvement monies are related to pupils on roll, their income has gone done and the school finds itself in a position where they are less able to support their pupils and hence their intake suffers further. Can something be done? Formula funding is inflexible. Some schools get extra funding due to social deprivation. This is based on the postcode of the pupils and NOT on the post code of the school.

  • Concern over changes. The Self-Evaluation concept was good in principle. One Governing Body now do OFSTED work and have found self-evaluation to be a big job.

  • Response -The SEF form should be completed by the Leadership team and NOT by the Governors. Governors have to evaluate their own performance as to how they have fulfilled their own responsibilities.

  • Comment - The short OFSTED in one school, at least, had proved to be less painful and more instructive. OFSTED inspectors had shown a great interest in children's views.

  • Special Needs. A larger number of pupils with special needs are coming through. This is seen as being part of the Inclusion policy and debate. Funding is seen as being a concern. There is a difficult balancing act between the requirements of all the pupils. The SEN-audit could be re-introduced in future.

  • All Heads are concerned about Inclusion.

  • Progress of Individual students. The emphasis is now on the progress of individual students rather than absolute standards. The parents/media need educating on this topic.

  • How will `School profile' replace the annual report to parents? The School Profile will be in a standardised format and certain data will be pre-populated into the report by the DFES. Governors will add their comments to inform the interpretation of the statistics provided.

Richard Mitchell was thanked for his informative presentation and for responding to the various questions raised.

Election of Officers

a. Chairman

Sylvia Vine was appointed.

Proposed - Ron Dadd

Seconded - Margaret Gray

Carried Unanimously

b. Vice-Chairman

Andrew Turk was appointed

Proposed - Sylvia Vine

Seconded - Sue Brett

Carried Unanimously

c. Hampshire Governor Representative Group (HGRG) Representatives

Sylvia Vine

Andrew Turk

Carried Unanimously

d. Service Review Group

Sylvia explained the role of this group. Although it is an information-only group and has no explicit decision making powers it is a useful forum where Governors can get exposed to service reports, strategic directions, funding outlooks, training program ideas etc.

Attendees were asked to contact the Havant Office if they wished to participate.

e. Steering Group Representatives ( if required )

This group is no longer active. There is a liaison with the Gosport and Fareham Group and the Summer meeting is a combined one.

f. Volunteers to join the Governors Working Practice Group

There is a Governors working practice group that meets in Winchester to look at good practice. Documents are scrutinised before being added to the Governors website.

Attendees were asked to contact the Havant Office if they wished to participate in this initiative.

It was announced that Janet Sheridan had recently been taken ill. The Patch Forum wish to send her their best wishes and hope that she will have a speedy recovery.

HGRG representatives had been asked to meet Education Personnel Services re. comments on changes to Staff dismissals and dismissal appeals procedures. Heads are now to be the dismissals authority.

Question - What is the status of UPS Threshold 3? What is going on? What is the procedure?

5. FEEDBACK from HGRG

  • HGRG met on 8th. June 2004

  • County Governors met on 22 June 2004.

  • Reports on these meeting have been distributed

  • Action - Check if this material is being distributed to Trosnant Infants school.

  • There was a Special Meeting of the HGRG on the subject of the complexities of education funding. Andrew Turk listed the attendees.

  • As this year is an election year it was believed that there would be a lot of pressure on at local level to minimise the increase in Council Tax, with concomitant consequences on school funding.

  • Hampshire is a "floor authority" and receives base-level funding.

  • Hampshire receive £609M in Transitional funding. They retain £63M and pass the balance (£540M ) on the schools. Of the schools balance, a further £59M is kept back for EOTAS, SEN etc.

  • SEN costs £13.1M, EOTAS costs £5M, ICT costs £1M

  • Home to school transport costs £20M

  • The funding timeframe is -

o 10th. November - School Forum Meeting

o 18th. January - Education Policy Review

o 20th. January - Decision-Day

o 24th. February - Council meeting re. school funding.

Action -

For 10th ( ??? ) November meeting governors wish to view presentation given to the leader of HCC - Please get back to Sylvia / Andrew

  • In order to be able to ask for more central monies, it is important that monies are spent on the children and not accumulated in individual schools contingency funds. At the moment there is £30M of such monies in school contingency funds across the County.

  • It is possible that the EOTAS budget could be given to the schools.

  • Question - Are other people have a problem with the new Finance System ( SAP ). Yes. The problems are being escalated.

6. Proposed Local Forum meeting dates for 2005

Spring Term 2005

 

Summer Term 2005

 

Autumn Term 2005

 

Local Forum

 

24 .2.2005

 

19.5.2005

 

20.10.2005

 

Agreed dates for :

 

HGRG

 

8.3.2005

 

7.6.2005

 

8.11.2005

 

County Forum

22.3.2005

 

21.6.2005

 

22.11.2005

 

7. ANY OTHER BUSINESS

Topics for next meeting.

· Self-evaluation

· Extended Schools

· Water in Secondary Schools. It was suggested that the Governors could approach the Health and Safety Officer for Hampshire .

· COSHH training

· Clerking of Committee Meetings. Governors are often asked to clerk committee meetings as a cost-saving measure. Choices and Good Practice for governors give advice on this matter. Any member involved in the discussion and decision making of a Committee should not, in general, be asked to Clerk at that meeting, as it would reduce their effectiveness.

There being no further business, the meeting closed at 9.05 pm.

DATE OF NEXT MEETING

24th February 2005DIVISIONAL GOVERNOR CONSULTATIVE PATCH MEETING

14th. October 2004

PRESENT:

R Dadd Hart Plain Junior

M Gray Waite End Primary School

M Causer Barncroft Infant

A. Woodford St. James Primary School Emsworth ( CofE)

J. Miles Front Lawn Junior

T. Parkes Hart Plain Infant School

L. Blackman Liphook C of E Junior School

B. Warder Meadowlands School, Lovedean

C.J. Preston Horndean C.E.Junior

R.Funnell Front Lawn Infants

Sue Emery Trosnant Infants

( in place of Penny Whitte )

B.Davison Liphook Infants

P.Dixon Mengham Infants School

M. Parr Langrish County Primary School

A.Jones Hulbert Junior School

S. Brett Padnell Junior School

D. Morris Meadowlands Infant

A. Turk Purbrook Park

H. Harrison Denmead Junior School

I. Macpherson Warblington

S. Vine Bidbury Infants