Governors
For infomation about our Governing Body, please scroll down to the bottom of the page.
Who are school governors?
Governors can be parents, staff at the school, residents or representatives of local organisations. They don’t need to be an expert - what’s really important is that they have energy, enthusiasm, time and a real desire to help provide children with the best possible education. To support new governors, we provide training from the local authority and a mentor. This short video provides more information.
What do governors do?
Governors have a varied and important role to make sure the school is constantly seeking to improve by working with the headteacher and staff to provide the best education it possibly can. Governors have three core functions:
- Planning the strategic direction of the school
- Overseeing financial performance of the school and ensuring money is well spent
- Holding the headteacher and senior leaders to account
The governor role is strategic rather than operational. Governors don’t get involved with the day to day running of a school, instead they support and challenge the school’s leadership team to drive school improvement – a critical friend. Governors may get involved with:
- setting and monitoring the school’s values, aims and policies;
- creating a safe and inclusive school culture;
- ensuring children attend regularly and achieve their potential;
- making sure the curriculum builds on the National Curriculum and is ambitious for all pupils;
- deciding how the budget should be spent and ensuring good value for money;
- making sure the school building is welcoming, safe and well used;
- recruiting staff, with a focus on safeguarding, and making sure they are developed.
Governors typically serve for four years and usually attend around six meetings a year. At Mossgate, we are keen for governors to have first-hand experience of meeting with teachers, looking at children’s books, talking to children about their learning and attending special events.
Parent governors
Parents and carers of pupils at the school are eligible to stand for election as parent governors and are elected by other parents if more than one parent puts themselves forward when a vacancy becomes available.
Co-opted governors
Co-opted governors do not have to have a direct connection to the school, but are appointed by the governing body because of the special skills they bring, for example finance or health & safety, to contribute to the effective governance and success of the school.
Being a school governor is a commitment and a responsibility, but offers you the chance to see first-hand the impact you can make in improving education for all children at Mossgate.
For more information about becoming a governor, please contact Mr Smith, Headteacher, at the school by email (head@mossgate.lancs.sch.uk), phone (850736) or private Facebook message.