Trustee of a preschool

[Rumplestiltskinismyname]

I have recently been elected onto the board of my son's preschool. I haven't been given much guidance by them as to what I need to do.

I have asked the secretary today for copies of all the policies- and she says that she doesn't have them, and that they are all held at the preschool in hard copy. Is this normal? I am concerned that the other trustees are not up to date with the policies, and it certainly wasn't an item for discussion at the last meeting.

Is there guidance as to what I should and shouldn't be doing anywhere online? Does anyone know? I want to do this role right!!!

I encountered similar problems at our village hall committee! Heads in the sand ostrich style! It is very difficult when you are the only one who says the firework display should not go ahead because the committee had no insurance to cover liability! It was too expensive apparently. They decided to go ahead anyway but call it a private party, despite having advertised it! At these moments of gross mismanagement, there is only one way to go and that is out of the door. We could have been liable for a multi million pound claim if a firework had badly injured someone! With your pre-school, it sounds as if no-one has brought it up to date but you may not be thanked for trying to do so - speaking as a firework night wrecker! If they have been sailing along in denial of how they really should be running the setting, can you really change things on your own? I would suggest you need some more parents who think like you so you have some back up. It may end up being difficult to manage if you do not get any support.

It seems the trustees don't understand their responsibilities. They need to learn quickly before they get into trouble (or get the pre-school into trouble). They should have insurance in place and all trustees should be subject to DBS checks. In your position I would also want to check that they had other insurance in place - employer's liability, public liability, etc. - and that all staff were subject to DBS checks.

Personally I would go with a as b is a little confrontational and sounds almost like you are attempting to blackmail the other trustees. I would print out the guidance for trustees from the Charity Commission website and give them all a copy. Then if I found they still weren't willing to take out insurance, etc. I would resign. I fully understand why you have decided to resign but personally I would fight to change things from within first and only resign when it became clear that was not possible. At the very least I think you should do as MegBusset suggests otherwise nothing will change.

Sorry to resurrect this thread, but I thought I would update.
I decided to stay on as a trustee, as decided to think on my stance for a few days. Like some said above, I do want to help, and I will be no help if I leave.

We have our next meeting this week, and I plan to raise all the issues I talked about above. I have also done some ringing around to get ideas of prices for insurance.

If anyone can send me more examples of why we need the insurance I would be grateful, as will use this as ammunition for arguing my cause.

I am planning on writing a short paper on it to circulate at the meeting. If they decide not to put in place the insurance then I am planning on resigning at that point, as still feel strongly about it.

As a trustee you have overall responsibility for the preschool's management. If there is, for example, misappropriation of funds, you can be held liable if you didn't take adequate steps to prevent it or monitor activity relating to the accounts, etc.

As a previous poster said, you are personally responsible for the financial state of the preschool. If the preschool gets into debt, the debts are yours.

This document on the Charity Commission website has some info on trustees insurance - scroll down to the bottom of section E.

There are so many potential areas of risk for a trustee of a pre-school.All the employment stuff, financial stewardship, child protection, liability.
I would not be too reassured by the insurance either.They will only cover you if everything is perfect, if there is not a policy in place to cover an eventuality they might not pay out, also they only cover you whilst you are a trustee.If a claim is brought against you retrospectively after you have ceased to become a trustee, you might be in trouble.

NB trustees and committee members are the same thing, they definitely are for preschools registered as charities anyway

This is not always the case.Only the treasurer and chair were trustees of the preschool I was part of.