Governors

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Sythwood Primary and Nursery School is part of the Bourne Education Trust. ‘Transforming schools; changing lives’ – the aim of the Bourne Education Trust is to create a community of outstanding schools with the highest aspiration and dedication to achieving the best outcomes for all learners.

Governance plays a key role in shaping the strategic direction of the school and challenging the school leaders to make sure every child 'excels'. The Bourne Education Trust delegates the majority of powers and responsibilities to Sythwood Primary and Nursery School Governors under the Scheme of Delegation.

Parent representatives on the Governing board are an important part of our school and home partnership. Not only are they directly aware of the results of school policy on our children and are easily accessible to you the parents, but they can bring a variety of skills needed in the present day governing of schools.

Who are we? What do we do?

We are all volunteers who are either parents, live in the local community or are passionate about enabling your children to have the best education they can have, to be the best they can be. We have no statutory responsibilities, however, the Bourne Education Trust believes it’s important to have local voices to challenge and support the school. There are three parts to our job:

1. To work with the leadership team to set the strategic direction of the school

2. To hold the school and Trust to account for performance

3. To ensure the money is well spent and resources well used.

When do Governors meet? What do we talk about in meetings?

We meet altogether six times a year, once every half term, on weekday evenings at school. They are called Local Governing Committee (LGC) meetings and are open, so anyone can ask to come along, sometimes however, there may be confidential items we need to discuss in private. We talk about things that help us hold the school to account, for example the Headteachers Report and Safeguarding. We also see presentations from staff about projects they are delivering in school.

How do we know we make a difference?

At the end of every meeting we ask ourselves what evidence we have from the meeting to show that we are being the best governors we can be for the children at Sythwood. Over the last year this has included agreeing and then reviewing monitoring visits, such as into safeguarding, hearing about the work to develop the curriculum, questioning how school supports the well-being of staff and senior leaders, challenging the school about what led to the strong results last year, what it was based on and how it can be sustained for the future.

What have we done to benefit Sythwood?

We asked Mrs Matheson and the SLT how they think we benefit Sythwood and these are their answers. Governors are advocates of Sythwood so they promote what we do; they are supportive of staff; offer different perspectives on what the school does; challenge us to reflect upon what we do and why and help us develop our plans for the future.

How could you get involved with the Local Governing Committee?

Governors generally hold their office for a period of four years and when parent governor positions become available, they will be advertised in the newsletter, along with application details. At the start of each academic year we vote whether to have open or closed meetings. Currently we hold open meetings. The dates are shown on the website and will be posted in the newsletter. If you would like to attend, please leave a message with the school office or email clerk@sythwood.surrey.sch.uk at least one week before the meeting is due to take place .

Our Governing committee is made up of 8 Governors (including the Headteacher). The constitution is as follows:

1 Headteacher
2 Parent governors
5 Co-opted governors
Associate governors as needed

The Chair of the Governing Committee is Gemma Ahmed. To contact Gemma, please email: clerk@sythwood.surrey.sch.uk. All postal correspondence should be sent to Gemma Ahmed, Chair of Governors, c/o Sythwood Primary School, Woking, GU21 3AX.

Name	Type of governor	Term start and duration	Governor role
Gemma Ahmed	Co-opted	27 November 2019 4 years	Chair of Governors Health & Safety and GDPR Link
Peter Allen	Parent	10 March 2023 - 4 years	Attendance & Safeguarding Link
Suzanne Austen	Co-opted	19 May 2022 4 years	Pupil Premium/Disadvantaged Link
Daniel Beggs	Co-opted	14 May 2024 - 4 years
John Hutchins	Parent	17 June 2024 - 4 years	Digital Technology
Millie Slater	Co-opted	23 March 2023 - 4 years	Vice Chair of Governors Quality of Education Link
Andy Swartfigure	Co-opted	23 March 2023 - 4 years	SEND Link
Nicola Matheson	Headteacher	Ex-officio
Karen Masella	Clerk to Governors