Education Select Committee Inquiry. Evidence submitted (original) (raw)

Since the 1980s state schools in England have been required to evidence transparency and accountability through the use of indicators and templates derived from the private sector and more recently globally circulating discourses of ‘good governance’ closely aligned with the IMF and World Bank. The idea here is that schools share characteristics which can be compared and analyzed to determine public service effectiveness and efficiency. The rise of academies and free schools (‘state-funded independent schools’) has resulted in a dispersion and concentration of these practices within schools, with direct consequences for school governors –those tasked with the responsibility of holding senior leadership to account for the financial and educational performance of the school. To complement the new powers and responsibilities devolved to schools under these arrangements, government now demand the inspection, audit and professionalization of all school governing bodies, with the aim to ensure good governance. Ofsted in particular emerges as a dominating presence under these circumstances, effecting and inscribing the conditions by which governors come to understand, know and practise their role. In this paper I draw on interview and observation data to consider 1) the role of Ofsted as a permanent ‘absent presence’, a spectre, shadow or big Other shaping and guiding meanings and practices of school governance; and 2) the impact of these trends on school governor relations and subjectivities in terms of how governors ‘make sense’ of their role, responsibility and contribution as meaningful and intelligible.

The South African education system is still in a transformation process. Old apartheid structures and governance are objects of restructuring and transformation. The transformation of the education system is carried out to promote and uphold the founding principles of the Constitution and the fundamental rights and freedoms of every person. Among the many aspects of the education system that need to be redressed is the management of schools. In this article, the author highlights problems and issues emerging from democratisation of the management of schools. In particular, the problems emanating from accountability questions such as: Whose responsibility is it? What are the place, position and responsibilities of parents in school governance? What are their duties and responsibilities with regard to accountability? The author attempts to identify essentials and forms of accountability within the spectrum of school governance and the focus is on the accountability of parents and the ...

Given this paper is set to be discussed in the context of a roundtable discussion I have rendered it more conversational in tone. I’m also aware that some participants in the discussion may be unfamiliar with the history of English education policy. I have therefore constructed a kind of ‘nuts and bolts’ paper for want a better description. It outlines the aims, context and data for my study as well as some of the recent developments to affect school organization and school accountability in England. Following this I draw on evidence to flesh out what it is school governors actually do and how these forms of ritual participation and their rationalization are impacted by the changing legal and power arrangements of different school setups and the encroachment of particular forms of accountability, notably finance, legal, performance and consumer. I have deliberately foregrounded the discussion around observable concrete practices, and therefore resisted engaging too much in conceptual or theoretical deliberation/engagement for the time being. However, I am keen to apply theory where it might serve to increase both awareness and intervention to affect change. Foucauldian approaches to governmentality spring to mind.

The changing education landscape in England, combined with a more rigorous form of governor regulation in the form of the Ofsted 2012 Inspection Framework, are together placing more demands than ever before on the 300,000 volunteer school governors in England. These school governors are, in many cases, directly accountable to the Secretary of State for Education. Using a form of Goffman’s frame analysis and drawing on theory which indicates that head teachers and inspection reports are highly influential regarding the ways in which governors make sense of their environment and accountability, this paper traces the development of a system which is highly specific to England, in order to evaluate to what extent present governor regulatory accountabilities can be seen as either conflicting or in harmony with head teacher and inspector understandings of the role. The paper concludes that there is considerable evidence that the current regulatory framework combined with conflicting and o...

School governing bodies in England have considerable powers and responsibilities with regard to the education of pupils. This paper explores how power relations operate, within governing bodies, through struggles over which types of knowledge are claimed and valued. The paper draws on the analysis of policy and on ethnographic research in the governing bodies of four maintained schools to explore the complex interactions between lay, educational and managerial knowledge. The paper suggests that educational and managerial expertise are privileged over lay knowledge. Hence, the concept of 'lay' knowledge, which is attached to external governors, is easily co-opted by managerial knowledge as it does not have alternative expert knowledge attached to it.

School governors play a vital role in the UK education system. However, research by the University of Bath Department of Education shows that schools often struggle to recruit governors with the necessary backgrounds and skillsets. This difficulty in recruiting is particularly apparent for schools in disadvantaged areas, which are most in need of effective governance. Initial research which began in 2008, and culminated in the report Governing our Schools, found that governors who brought with them experience from paid employment commonly made a significant contribution to school governing, and that the skills which made school governing bodies effective could be found in workplaces across the country. Since then, there have been a number of changes to education policy that affect school governing and raise its profile; revitalising the importance of research in this area. In early 2014, University of Bath researchers from the Department of Education, in conjunction with the Nationa...

School governing bodies in England have considerable powers and responsibilities with regard to the education of pupils. This article explores how power relations operate, within governing bodies, through struggles over which types of knowledge are claimed and valued. The article draws on the analysis of policy and on ethnographic research in the governing bodies of four maintained schools to explore the complex interactions between lay, educational and managerial knowledge. The article suggests that educational and managerial expertise are privileged over lay knowledge. Hence, the concept of ‘lay’ knowledge, which is attached to external governors, is easily coopted by managerial knowledge as it does not have alternative expert knowledge attached to it.