Anyone a school govenor?

[Travellingatthespeedoflight]

I’m thinking of applying…any major reasons not to go for it? I am currently on mat leave but will have the time when I go back to work, and hope I can be valuable to the school and school community.

There is a parent govenor vacancy at my dc’s school BUT I feel like it will probably be a popularity contest and I won’t get voted in. There are community govenor vacancies at two other local schools, so considering applying for one of those instead. Am I mad?

Thank you!

Go for it! It is a very worthwhile role. I would say it is less about being a "popularity contest" and more about what you can bring to the role.

Ask to have an informal chat with the chair of governors (their details will be on the school website). That will give you a flavour for what they are looking for and how things run.

I’ve been a governor at various schools for over 15 years and my experience is that they are a bit like book clubs - the vibe varies wildly depending on who is in the group. Therefore the tone changes when someone joins or leaves. When I first became a governor the group was dominated by a couple of alpha males which was not great, but then they left and it got much better!

I would say give it a go if you can - it feels good to feel you are contributing to taking the school forwards and there is always something interesting to learn from your perspective. There is lots of training you can do and usually another governor will be your mentor for the first year which helps.

Thank you!

It seems there is one parent govenor at ‘my’ school and the chair and vice chair are appointed by the Trust. The school I like in the community has parents as Chair and VC, one lives on my road and the other runs scouts so I can have an informal chat with either this week. I am quite excited about this opportunity!

My dad was a chair of governors for many, many years, across a range of settings.

The only things he'd say in regard to other governors was:

• Make sure you can genuinely make the commitment. If you say you can attend X number of meetings a year, you make sure you do.
• In larger schools, especially secondaries, you'll probably be asked to pick an "area" to be particularly involved in. That might be finance, HR, curriculum, SEN, wider community. Try and stick with an area that ties in with anything you've had either professional involvement with, or deep personal experience.
• Don't become a parent governor with the sole hope of changing things for your personal child. You'll be sussed out very quickly and relegated to a mere "seat warmer" role faster than you can blink.

All of this. With regards to the time commitment, for me it seems to be all or nothing, sometimes I have 10 hours governor work in a week (maybe twice a term, not much happens in holidays) other times I can go weeks where nothing much happens apart from keeping an eye on email. People miss the occasional meeting, that's unavoidable, but you really need to treat it as seriously as you would a job and there can be a lot of reading to do between meetings. Find out the schedule of meetings before you commit (ours are set in the summer term for the following academic year) and see if you can realistically commit to it. Ours are in person, with only the odd person joining by teams.

I've been a governor at my children's primary school for a few years now and find it interesting. Two meetings a term are the basic commitment (one full governors and one a committee one), with a lot of papers to read beforehand. Most of us also hold a 'link governor' responsibility for a specific area, which may involve some extra work. But it is manageable. You learn a lot and there is training available etc. I went for the parent governor vacancy and expected it to be a popularity contest, but it doesn't actually appeal to many people, so there weren't loads of candidates and also very low voter turn out. So it was relatively easy to get elected by simply reminding friends across the school to actually bother to go and vote. But that may be different at other schools. I appreciate getting to know my children's school better but would find it interesting at another school also.

I am a chair of governors. Being a governor can be a very rewarding role. If you have the time and the enthusiasm, then do apply. We had 2 applicants for a parent governor role previously and because they were both great candidates we co-opted one and the other applicant became a parent governor. Most schools have vacancies.

Was a parent governor at my daughters school when she was small. Very rewarding, learnt lots and loved going into the classes to spend time with the children.
Training was excellent as well.

I have done it at 2 schools as a coopted governor. I found the first school governing body very frustrating to work with, mostly because nothing ever seemed to get done (any decision was always deferred until the next meeting because they spent a lot of time waffling) and they would rearrange meetings at the last minute (ie: when I had rushed out of work to be there on time) because someone's kids were ill or similar. However, the training provided by the council was excellent and I referred to it a lot. Fortunately, we moved house around 18 months into starting so I had an excuse to leave.

The next school was much better - more action focused, less chat and I felt it was very rewarding as my skills were valued and I could see "my" impact. In many ways, the first school felt like a bit of a mums get together (the Chair had been doing it for years, as had most of the others. They all had kids at the school so knew each other socially too) whereas the other was much more professional where people treated it like a job, which is how it should be. I was at that school for around 3 years and stopped when I was pregnant.

I would do it again, but I would push to understand the dynamics of the Body before committing. Perhaps see if you can observe a meeting? Or at least read through the minutes from the last year or so to get a sense of how they operate, how often they meet, how big/varied the group is etc.

My work place also gave 7 days a year (in addition to annual leave) for "community" roles such as being a governor which is pretty essential for monitoring visits etc if you usually work during the school day.

Thanks everyone! I applied but there is currently a ballot taking place - I know from all the playground chatter that I won’t win but there are community govenor vacancies at two other local schools so I will try there.