I have been catching up on some of the backlog of e-mails and paperwork and Geoff Roberts who is the Vice-Chair at the NW SILC sent me this after the recent governors conference...

"Dear Chris, I wanted to say how much I enjoyed the governors conference myself and to thank you and Liz both for inspirational contributions. The future of governance is a critical issue and one which seems to be on far too few govrning body agendas - perhaps not surprising when I was sat on a table where one governor did not even know the name of the school on the opposite side of the road to them, another did no know what NPQH was and yet another had not heard of FMSS...both of these latter ones were Chairs!

I am reluctant to criticise, yet it does seem to me that leaving the education of our future generation in the hands of such uninformed people is 'dangerous'. I guess that the plea is for much better, more rigorous and compulsory governor training. I am currently agnostic about the idea of paying governors generally but do feel that at least a Chair who is recompensed for their efforts would make a difference.

What do you think? Geoff"

I think this is a debate that is long overdue. Is governance an anachronism?... how do we strtaegically manage the performance of our schools?... what models could we develop that will ensure rigour, focus and challenge while preserving democratic, community and stakeholder accountabilities?

Happy to discuss!
Chris