Jonathan Ellam

The current challenges facing schools, and therefore by default governors and trustees, may at times feel hard to prioritise and manage. In this blog we will try to support with ensuring the impossible feels a bit more possible.

Effective school governance plays a major part in ensuring that schools and academies are accountable to all stakeholders, well managed and focused on achieving the best possible outcomes for all their pupils. One method of checking this is with a self-review of your governing body/ trust board. A self-evaluation enables board members to assess their performance, review governance practices, and ensure they remain on track with their strategic priorities.

As guidance for both the academy and maintained sectors on risk management becomes clearer, and further aligned, we will look beyond the traditional SWOT analysis, used by many to identify risk, to the much wider scope of a risk register and ‘emerging risk radar’ underpinned by PESTLE analysis.

What follows is neither an endorsement of the new DfE guidance or a criticism of its aims and scope but rather a piece to hopefully stimulate discussion by boards so that a new perspective can be brought to bear on this thorny topic.

This blog touches upon recent developments in safeguarding including an update from Ofsted on its approach to inspection and looks in more detail at the school Single Central Record (SCR) and the collective responsibility of governors for safeguarding.

According to the recent NGA Annual governance survey 77% of boards are struggling with recruitment and retention, up from 50% in 2015. There’s no corresponding data on succession planning but suffice to say this is having a knock-on effect on boards ability to recruit and/or plan succession to the Chairs role and as importantly the Vice chair role.

As another academic year draws to a close this is an opportunity to consider different ways of working for the new academic year, new thinking on our approach to the various challenges that lie ahead and to reflect on what worked well and areas for improvement from the past year.

Closing the gap between the disadvantaged and their peers is an ongoing challenge for many schools. One of the many damaging impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic is to widen the gap.

The experience of being Chair of the school or academy board can best be summed up by the three letters AOB – despite the best laid plans it’s the unexpected items that make the job challenging, unpredictable and occasionally exciting and rewarding.

As 2023 gets underway the fumes of the pandemic’s legacy continue to hamper school’s ability to get back to business as usual. However, those impacted pupils of all ages deserve the chance to breath the clean air of normality and stability to enable them to receive the best education and reach their potential.

There is no doubt that being effective as both a governor and a board takes hard work and dedication at the best of times. I think it’s no exaggeration to say that our job has got a whole lot harder of late with boards facing a perfect storm of challenges that require resilience, character and even more commitment to training and self-improvement to overcome.  

Jonathan Ellam details how all the small acts of governance needs to be planned and thought out and how a vision without a carefully planned mission will almost certainly fail.