Two governor questions about headteacher pay and clerks

[Thethingswedoforlove]

I am on the headteacher pay panel. But no one appears to think it relevant that I shd know actual salary. It is all about the points which I get. But the context seems hard to operate without. Am I being kept in the dark for a good reason? Or is it normal to effectively meet to rubber stamp a decision on what to award based on meeting of objectives (decided by others). Also the head seems to want to take control of what the clerk can/ can't do for the governors (I thought was clerk to the governors?) and also about how frequently the gov meetings shd be. All doesn't feel quite right to me.....

[JumpandScore]

The pay policy must be available for staff (and governors). It should be either saved on a drive that's accessible to all or a paper copy should be available in school.

Most of our governors turn up to meetings with their ipads and read stuff directly from them.

If you really need to print things, then don't think it's reasonable of the head to refuse (and TBH, it's not her decision, but the governors' who are in charge!) but it shouldn't be necessary and schools do waste a massive amount of printing so it's right that this is a focus.

[lougle]

I'm sorry. I can see how hostile it may have seemed. I didn't realise you were new to governance and, tbh, I saw it as a list of excuses (no printer, no time, no challenge, etc.)

So....starting again. I presume that if you only meet once per term as a whole GB, you have separate resources/standards and improvements/finance committees?

Is your budget tight at the moment? Budgets have been flat cash for around 5 years, so each year the same money is having to go further, because of inflation and salary uplifts. Added to this, the capital budget allocations were slashed a few years ago. Has anyone asked the HT why there is no printing allowed?

I take it you have a separate pay panel from the HT performance management panel?

[Thethingswedoforlove]

No worries lougle. Yes we have Sep performance review and pay panels. Perf review has met already, pay due to meet soon. Money actually not really tight this year but we can see it getting tighter so def makes sense to be prudent (which the head is being but I didn't like the approach). Ironically it is for the finance committee that the edict was issued! So I need to go onto fronter see the documents which is pretty convoluted process (which I will do if I can from an iPad!). Not having met this school year feels wholly unacceptable frankly as I have no idea about what on earth is going on. A chat with the chair feels like a good place to start. And I have alerted the pay panel to the new issue re pay scales. Pretty sure we didn't adopt anything about the new process last year ..... All good advice here thanks

[admission]

If you expect ofsted coming shortly, then it seems the school have a very long way to go to be getting a "good" from your posts. Has anybody done anything to prepare for a visit?

[Thethingswedoforlove]

Lots and lots has been done to prepare for a visit including a peer review. We came out well. It is just the governance that leaves much to be desired. Which I know sounds weird. Actually the school impresses and is a good place. It just feels that it isn't very good from what I have said on here!

[lougle]

The difficulty is that if the governing body isn't good, then the school will be Requires Improvement (or worse!) because there is no separate category for Governance -it all comes under leadership and management.

[lougle]

Just as the whole Ofsted can be failed the instant the inspector walks through the door if safeguarding measures aren't seen to be in place -doesn't matter what the rest of the school's like.

[Lizsmum]

Does your school have a subscription to The Key? it's a really good resource for any governor. The Key You can get very clear answers to any question from them. And do you belong to the National Governors Association? NGA Again, there is a cost to the school but worth it in terms of the support you, andall the governors, can access.

[mrz]

www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/451908/School-teachers_-pay-and-conditions-document-2015.pdf page 12

[Thethingswedoforlove]

Thanks all. Actually I have found out today that the personnel committee has thought about the new pay scales issue and fgb has adopted their proposal. It just should have been communicated to the pay panel better! We are members of nga but not the key as far as I am aware..... Thanks for the recommendation

[lougle]

I'm really sorry to be pedantic, but how could the FGB have adopted a proposal when you as a member of that FGB had no idea?

To me, that says that either a fundamental decision is not being given enough 'air time' so all of you can consider it, or a subset of Governors is making decisions on behalf of the GB (which is OK if it's a delegated responsibility but not if not).

[Thethingswedoforlove]

Well I did miss one meeting at the very end of term as dd1 was taken very ill. So I can only assume it went through then. It definitely wasn't tabled as a major agenda item and I didn't receive any papers on it. So i agree it definitely wasn't given enough airtime. I made sure I read those papers scrupulously as I had intended never to miss a fgb meeting. I am having lunch with the chair tomorrow. I will ask her that question (amongst many others).

[Thethingswedoforlove]

I will check whether this issue is a delegated responsibility. I would have thought it would have been flagged anyway. Maybe it was raised orally at the meeting (but if so it shd be in the minutes).