The RSA School Governors Network is a space for current, past and future school governors - and anyone with an interest in education - to share what makes a good governor and how school governance can help to create schools fit for the 21st century. It will be co-created with its members to meet their needs and allow them to share their insights, experience and practice through a mix of face to face events, online communities and research, all supported by the Projects Team at 8 John Adam Street.

If you are interested in joining or funding this initiative, a full project outline is available for download.

Download the project outline (PDF, 84KB)
Download the project outline (Word, 162KB)

    

Further information is available from the project coordinator, Sarah Tucker.

In October of 2008 a small group of network members created a vision statement for the network, outlining why we think governance in schools is an important force for change in society. Here is the document we created, but it is not set in stone. We want it to be discussed and updated. Please read it and help shape the project by sharing your thoughts in an email.

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As governors and as citizens in the wider community we are all potential agents for change in education. Governance creates an education institution's ethos, sets its ambitions and steers its strategic direction. It is the means by which a community ensures that its education institutions are serving learners', local community and the wider public’s interests and acting in a way consistent with its aims and values. Education governance is one of the few exercises in mass voluntary citizenship in the UK. Those involved in governance should develop its capacity to be a real opportunity for learners, parents, staff and the wider community to participate in shaping our shared future.

To support this, ambition the RSA is starting a School Governance Network, a space for people to support effective and innovative approaches school governance. The world and learner’s needs are constantly changing and the way we govern schools and colleges must anticipate that change. The RSA’s network will nurture next practice and explore how the broad values of governance translate to everyday contexts.

At its heart, the RSA's purpose is to support active citizens in delivering social progress, in becoming the open, resilient, and other-regarding society we want to be. Education has a clear role in realising that social vision. Recently the RSA has worked with Fellows and a wide range of other organisation to draft a charter for Education in the 21st Century which sets out our vision of the aims and values of education.

The network is co-created with its users, and according to the people we've asked who are involved with leading and governing education institutions, good governance should translate into these things:

It provides a skill set and a profile of members that help the institution achieve its long term goals.
These include knowledge of education, finance, HR, project management, and statutory obligations but should also include softer skills. These might be creative thinking or problem-solving skills, engaging and involving communities or simply interpersonal skills. Above all they interpret the shared vision for the establishment as a strategic plan and they create ways of knowing if the institution is achieving all its aims.

It shapes, reflects and commits to the ethos of the institution.
The way a school or college is governed ought to reflect the needs and aspirations of everyone who contributes to its work, especially students, parents and the communities they serve as well as LEAs and government. It should be the process by which an education institution decides its aspirations for itself and sets its strategic direction. Well governed schools and colleges are sociable - the people involved in governing them provide opportunities and time to get to know learners and their families, staff, and the wider community. An education institution must keep looking outward.

It interacts with and responds to the changing world.
Everyone involved in governance needs time to learn about and reflect upon change in the world learners live in, and how that affects education. This includes curriculum changes and government policy but also new insights into the wellbeing and development of people as citizens and learners. Governors, so often self-starters who have a love of learning themselves, need formal training and mutual support.

It challenges and supports the school or college’s executive team.
Those involved in governance are in partnership with the institution’s staff and head in realising its ambitions. This means having the confidence to challenge accepted wisdom or entrenched ways of doing things if necessary; being pro-actively engaged with the way the institution is delivering its aims and the thinking behind it; knowing enough about the context the establishment works in to ask probing questions. A governing body remains substantially independent of the executive team and represents the school or college’s collective interests - and the interests of its learners in particular - before all others.

It is accountable and it holds others to account.
This means that the people and the structures that govern an institution must transparently serve the interests of all its stakeholders - both those of staff, pupils, parents and the community the establishment is in as well as government. Those who are less able to represent themselves in decision-making that will affect them - for whatever reason - should be actively consulted or represented as appropriate. They are able to measure whether the school is fulfilling its academic and pastoral ambitions and can diagnose any problems in doing that.