Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
Ode to Michael Gove (following the sacking of Downhills Governing Body)
Here's something I wrote in response to the sacking of the Governing Body at Downhills Primary School in Tottenham and how angry and disenfrachised it's making us all feel:
ODE TO MICHAEL GOVE
There once was a fella named Gove
That only his mother could love
The Downhills GB
Said ‘NO ACADEMY’
And so he just gave ‘em the shove
But that’s not the end of the story
Be you Labour, LibDem or a Tory
Democracy’s dead
You have put it to bed
And the future is looking quite gory
Revolution is not the Brit way
At least that’s what most people say
But you’ve pushed us some more
You’ve caused a furore
And Govey, you might rue the day
In Tottenham we fight for our schools
We’re not ‘Trots’, but nor are we fools
We won’t let you butcher
Our dear children’s future
Just ‘cos we don’t play by your rules
Yes, it’s ‘carve ‘em up’ time for the state
The NHS and our schools on a plate
But is it improvement
Or big assets movement?
It’s the greed and the lies that we hate
‘Sponsor’ Harris sell carpets and mats
The rug trade has made them fat cats
But kids all find flooring
Incredibly boring
And we doubt it’ll help with their SATS
So here’s one last thought, Mr Gove
Since you seem to have something to prove
Take your ‘sponsor’
And stick it up yer bum, Sir
And then let us see how you move!
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on
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Clive, I've tried to answer your questions courteously. But surely you must realise your own lack of basic knowledge in this area.
Who makes the "best" school governors? That's like asking whether a tall short/male/female person makes the "best athlete". Or whether A or B is the best new person for a particular work group. It depends on their talents, skills, experience, and what's needed by the group.
The best school governing bodies are those which work together co-operatively. A group of people pooling their knowledge, energies, skills and ideas. Bringing experience from different angles: the head and other staff; parents, people from the community. Two LEA appointed governors I've met recently are a retired headteacher - from a school in another borough - and a former probation officer. Neither were nor had been councillors.
If you really want to learn about this, I have one last suggestion. School Governing Bodies are in two parts. Part 2 deals with confidential matters - like finance and personal issues. But Part 1 of their meetings are open to the public. I suggest you contact your nearest local school and arrange to go to part 1 of its Governors' meeting. Watch what happens.
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Permalink Reply by Clive Carter on
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Alan I hope you don't think the question about Special Measures (and from whom control is removed), was discourteous. I won't be making up any limericks about you or anyone else in this discussion.
I checked out your Wikipedia link on Special Measures, but its a brief and bald discussion which doesn't say who control is being taken away from.
I'd appreciate it if, with your considerable knowledge and experience, you could humour an ignorant immigrant in your own words – some others might find it illuminating as well.
I'll rephrase the second proposition a last time.
Do you think that, other things being equal, its better to have a Labour Party member as a school governor than either unaligned or (worse), a governor from another party?
The background to all this of course, is that the State has stepped in to the governance of some local education. I'm trying to understand why and I reckon you are well-placed to help.
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Permalink Reply by David Barry on
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With some diffidence I butt in to this exchange between what appear to be two longstanding, and no doubt affectionate, adversaries. My qualifications for doing so are:-
1. I am not a member of any political party
2. I am a school governor; actually for what it is worth I am chair.
3. I am not resident in Haringey, but in Islington. (The school I am chair of governors at is Ashmount Primary School).
Ashmount is a community school and community schools have a governing body based on the "stakeholder" model. Some governors are elected by the parents -"Parent Governors", some are elected by the staff, some are co opted by the governing body (as a way of bringing people on with skills and expertise lacking from a particular GB) and some are appointed by the Local Education Authority, which in this case is the council. Islington in the case of Ashmount, Haringey in the case of the schools you are talking about.
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Governing bodies vary in size. Each governing body chooses what size to be within a range that I forget. The size determines how many governors of each type there are, (while the overall size is fixed by each school the ratio of types of governors are not.)
In the case of Ashmount we have chosen (and it was us and NOT Islington) to have 17 governors. This is quite large, but it works for us. Of that we have 6 elected parent governors. They are elected by secret ballot of the parents for a term of four years. In Ashmount Parent Governor elections are normally contested.
The head is a governor, ex officio and there are three further staff governors chosen by secret ballot of the staff. An element one might say of industrial democracy.
We are allowed to co opt up to four governors. At the moment we have three, myself, because they desired to keep me on, and have me as chair. Both my children were at the school. And two former parent governors, one of whom is an architect and the other of whom works as a building control surveyor for Islington Council (we are moving to a new building soon and there has been much technical work with plans and contracts)
There are four LEA nominees. I will explain about them next post.
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The first point to note is that the LEA nominees are four out of 16 current governors.
In Islington LEA appointments are made through the parties. At the moment because of the balance of votes at the last council election, the parties have agreed that three of the four are nominated by the Labour Party and one is nominated by the Liberal democrats. One of the nominees is a former parent at the school, one is a Labour Councillor in our local ward, one is not a member of a party but the retired Head teacher of a Girls secondary school in another borough. One is a young woman , a member of the Labour Party, who has arrived in the area recently and volunteered to be a school governor.
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While the LEA nominees are only 25 per cent of the GB, and never in my experience, act as a bloc anyway, they are valued members. And having your local councillor on the GB can be really handy. We would be sorry to loose them.
Does all this help?
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As should be clear from my earlier posts about the structure of Governing Bodies, the governance of local schools is unaffected by the political complexion of the local authority, except insofar as a quarter or less of the governors are appointed by the local authority. In any case, in my experience LEA nominees are not "whipped" in any way. In any case very few of the decisions of a governing body would have any party political dimension. A decision to convert to being an academy would probably be the exception. But in that case if the parent and teacher representatives thought it a good idea then the LEA representatives would be outvoted.
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Permalink Reply by John D on
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Thanks Alan.
In that case since " LAs are encouraged to appoint high-calibre governors to schools that need the most support and to appoint candidates irrespective of any political affiliation or preference " they should not be asking for candidates' political affiliation.
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As promised, I sent a councillor’s enquiry about the online form and this evening received the reply below sent on behalf of Ms Libby Blake, Director, Children and Young People's Service
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Dear Cllr Stanton
Thank you for your enquiry regarding the online application form in relation to becoming a school governor. The reason behind the question asking whether an applicant is a member of a political party is because Local Authority governors can be members of a political party. The response to this question then assists the Councillors from the two main political parties in making recommendations for the filling of the vacancies.
When we receive expressions of interest from prospective LA governors we do make it clear that membership of a political party is not a requirement, and that it is not compulsory to answer this question. We also heed the guidance given by the DfE website which, in terms of the role of the LA governor, states “LAs are encouraged to appoint high calibre governors to schools that need the most support and to appoint candidates irrespective of any political affiliation or preference”. The School Governance (Constitution) (England) Regulations 2007 merely state “LEA governor” means a person who is appointed as a governor by the Local Education Authority.
At present, we are in the process of producing a protocol for the appointment of LA governors, and this will include a review of the current application forms to ensure that they are fit for purpose.
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I'm sorry you're not able to understand the answer.
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Alan thank you for taking the trouble to make an enquiry about this and for posting the answer. The only solid information that can be drawn from this (otherwise) nonsense-reply, is a confirmation that there is currently a question whether or not a Governor Applicant is a member of a political party.
The reason behind the question asking whether an applicant is a member of a political party is because Local Authority governors can be members of a political party.
Surely this standard of reasoning would be a fail at GCSE level? It is worrying that this is the level of logic and intellect that obtains at a senior level within the council and someone involved in education to boot. Local Authority governors can also go into a shop and buy a loaf of bread. Members of political parties can be members of a chess club.
Putting aside the nonsensicalness of the answer, politics (or membership of political parties) should not IMO be a criteria for a School Governor.
I wonder how long the question about political party membership has been in place? The suspicion has to be, that this information is used in order to favour members of the party of the Majority Group, regardless of their suitability as school governors.
It is a question that may intimidate or discourage some Applicants. It also indicates to all applicants that poltical considerations are important enough to be represented explicitly on the application form.
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"You could put a red rosette on that loaf of bread [...] and it would romp home in Tottenham Hale."
"Bread and Roses?" Thanks, Will Hoyle. And I had no idea you knew any Labour history. That's the nicest thing a Tottenham Tory candidate has ever written about me.
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