Co-Opted Governor Recruitment

Thank you for your interest in becoming a co-opted governor for Sheddingdean Community Primary School. Being a Governor is a chance to make a valuable contribution to the lives of children and supporting them to receive excellent education and become outstanding citizens of the world.

We are keen to attract two co-opted governors who live or work in the community, who have insight into the context in which our students live. We would also be interested to hear from other people who may not live in the local area, but who could bring valuable skills and experience.

We want to create a governing body of committed people ready to work hard for the school and its community. We want to attract a group of people with a range of skills and experiences, and with diverse backgrounds and perspectives in order to represent our local school community.

Co-opted governors will serve alongside parent, staff and local authority governors.

All governors, however appointed, have the same role as part of the local governing body. It is responsible for ensuring the clarity of vision, ethos and strategic direction of the school, ensuring financial probity and holding its leaders to account for the educational performance of the school and its pupils.

The Governing Board operates at a strategic level and is not involved in the day-to-day running of the school. We are responsible for both the conduct of the school and for promoting high standards. We perform this role by setting the vision for the school, ensuring that the school works efficiently and effectively towards achieving its vision, and that the school provides a high quality education for its pupils. This is done by building a thorough knowledge of the school and its community, by both supporting and constructively challenging the school, and by ensuring accountability and compliance.

Governors do not need to be experts in the field of education. They need to be interested in the school and in the welfare of its pupils and have the time and enthusiasm to get involved. The skills you have can be very useful to the Governing Board.

Governors need to be able to build relationships with a range of people, to work as part of a team, to be able to question, and to make connections between different types of information. All governors are expected to be able to read budget reports and data on school standards.

Our Governing Board has certain expectations of governors, which currently are:

to attend and contribute to termly meetings of the full Governing Board,
when required, to sit on any committee or working party and attend all associated meetings
participate in any hearings that may happen, such as exclusions or complaints
to monitor a subject link area within the school, e.g. Numeracy, Literacy, Special Educational Needs, Early Years, etc., and meet with the staff subject leader on a minimum of a termly basis, reporting on each visit to the Governing Board
to visit the school formally for monitoring purposes as directed by the Governing Board,
to visit the school informally on occasion,
to commit to attend training courses,
to comply with the expectations set out in our Code of Conduct.

In return, our Governing Board commits to:

provide you with an experienced governor as mentor,
provide you with a structured induction,
provide access to quality training,
develop your skills in strategic management,
offer you an insight into the wider perspective of the school,
give you the opportunity to make a difference to our school and the outcomes for our pupils.

Who is eligible

Co-opted governors can be drawn from the local or wider community.

Anyone over the age of 18 is eligible to apply to be a school governor, except for individuals legally barred from being governors. All governors will have to undertake a disclosure and barring (DBS) check for criminal convictions and suitability for working with children. They will also have to complete a due diligence check carried out by the Department for Education. Both of these processes involve completing a form and giving personal details such as name, date of birth, addresses, work history and financial information.

How to apply and appointment process

If you would like to be considered to be a co-opted governor at Sheddingdean Community Primary School, please write to chair@sheddingdean.co.uk telling us why you would like to be a governor and what experience you would bring.

Please enclose a CV if you have one, or if not please just tell us about your work or community involvement, we would also like you to provide two contacts for references in your application form which can be downloaded from the link below:

Co-Opted_Governor_Application_Form.pdf

Please also confirm that you are not disqualified from being a governor by completing this form:

Co-Opted_Governor_Declaration_Form.pdf

Once we have reviewed your application we will ask you to complete a skills audit, to allow the Governing board to understand your skill set.

The final stage is an interview with the Headteacher and Chair of Governors.