Nurturing, Enquiring, Inspiring, Achieving

Offham School Governors

Welcome to our Governors’ section

All schools have a Governing Body which is responsible for overseeing many of the strategic decisions of the school. A key role is to act as a ‘critical friend’ which offers support, constructive advice, a sounding board for ideas, a second opinion on proposals and help where needed. However, a ‘critical friend’ also challenges, asks questions, seeks information, improves proposals and helps to arrive at the best solution for the pupils, staff and whole school community.

The Governing Body works in close partnership with the Headteacher, Senior Leadership Team, staff and the Local Authority. Whilst the Headteacher is responsible for the day to day running of the school, the governors are responsible and accountable for the school. It ensures the school functions well and maintains the proper range of academic and social objectives. The Governing Body works as a team with shared responsibilities.

Governors never make decisions on their own, nor do they act as individuals. The Full Governing Body meets 6 times per year.

Circle Model

The governors at Offham Primary School have adopted a hybrid model of governance. This means that the Governing Body works as a ‘whole team’, meeting 6 times per year, once in each term, without any separate committees. An agenda for each meeting will include all the tasks which the governing body is required to consider, and the governing body will ‘commission’ assignments or activities arising from the business of the meeting, which will be recorded in the minutes.

In addition to ‘commissioning’ activities or actions on their behalf, the governing body may wish to delegate monitoring activities to ‘monitoring pairs’ or ‘individuals’. This could apply to statutory functions, and/or the priorities of the School Single Plan, which is managed under our 5 values and EYFS as headings. In each case where a function has been delegated there is a statutory duty to report any action or decision to the governing body at the next meeting.