NORFOLK GOVERNORS' NETWORK

Norfolk Governor Services and Norfolk Governors' Network Liaison Meetings   

Remit: Termly meetings between members of Norfolk Governor Services and members of the NGN County Committee to liaise about joint working and other issues. For more information please contact This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Notes from the meeting on the 9th June 2009 at Dussindale Primary School, Norwich 

Present:

• Governor Services: Sue Platt 
• NGN: Stephen Adamson, Peter Hart, Mike Grimble, Lucinda Poliakoff and Martin Sale         

The notes of the meeting held on the 17^th March 2009 were agreed as accurate    

It was agreed to plan to hold a Spring Conference in two venues - on the 13th March 2010 in Norwich and on the 26th March 2010 in King's Lynn. Funding for refreshments would be sought from Fred Corbett. Sue and Martin would meet early  early in the Autumn term to put a firm proposal together. The conference would focus on 21st Century Schools legislation and was likely to include sessions on:- extended schools; collaborative working; partnerships and federations and Children and Young People’s plans   Action: SP/MS 

Sue agreed to look through the feedback received from these conferences and deal with issues raised through the new question and answer section of the Governor Services website. Action: SP 

Sue confirmed that she had received 8 responses regarding her suggestion that ‘Agenda’ may in future be issued in electronic format. The feedback had been against this proposal and she was now considering a number of options but in the meantime intended to issue a further edition of Agenda before the end of this term

Martin confirmed that NGN would be circulating the June NGN Newsletter electronically via chairs and clerks to the School e-mail address for circulation to all governors 

Sue confirmed that she was pursuing her bid to provide this training to governors in Norfolk. At present the product offered by G.E.L. appeared to be better value. She hoped for a decision in the Autumn Term on this             

Sue, Polly, Mike, Stephen and Martin had worked with Fred Corbett to produce a draft document setting out the need for and advantages of cluster governance arrangements. Consultations on the document would take place this and early next term before publication         

Sue confirmed that a new group would be formed during the Autumn term          

Martin confirmed that this would be held in November (date to be fixed) and was likely to include presentations/discussions on School Improvement Partners and Safeguarding (including the soon to be issued model policy on Child Protection)                                                                        

Sue reported that:-

• She and her colleagues continued to face significant pressures of work. These included a sizeable number of individual school issues (e.g. - Use and understanding of schools complaints procedures – HR issues arising from staffing adjustments) which were extremely time consuming.
•  The joint NGN/Governor Services chairs’ seminars held this term had been successful and she hoped to work with NGN to develop this in the future
• She expected new model policy documents to be made available to governors in the next term dealing with child protection and equality duties
• It was possible that further training sessions on the Common Assessment Framework would be offered to governors during the next school year

Action: MS and SP 

Subject to confirmation by Sue this would be held at the Norwich Professional Development Centre at 9.30 am on the 11^th  November 2009 Action: SP