Teachers with DC in the same school..

[Amber]

Parents tend to become governors because of a vested interest in their own children. I've seen a few (by no means the majority) cross the line in my time and have no shame about it. Beware the 'helicopter parent' governors is what I say.

+1
I have also seen this when I was working with a governing body once (not my own children's school). Nightmare interference with things like homework policy.

[KB]

Parents tend to become governors because of a vested interest in their own children. I've seen a few (by no means the majority) cross the line in my time and have no shame about it. Beware the 'helicopter parent' governors is what I say.

+1
I have also seen this when I was working with a governing body once (not my own children's school). Nightmare interference with things like homework policy.

I think this is rather unfair on the parents who give up time and effort using professional skills and first hand experience to work for the benefit of all the pupils and staff.
There may be those who take on the role for selfish reasons but for those who take the role responsibly it is hard work and can be extremely stressful.

[Amber]

I think this is rather unfair on the parents who give up time and effort using professional skills and first hand experience to work for the benefit of all the pupils and staff.
There may be those who take on the role for selfish reasons but for those who take the role responsibly it is hard work and can be extremely stressful.

Oh I am quite sure it is stressful and a huge amount of work. Not something I would want to do at all - but not for that reason. Personally I feel quite strongly that it is generally not a desirable thing that parents should sit on school governing bodies just because they are parents.

The devolving of powers to untrained and unpaid governors is not a good thing at all in my view, and only makes inequalities between schools more profound, as those in leafy middle class areas end up with doctors, lawyers and HR people on the governors, and schools like one I taught in, in a less salubrious area, get no one. The kinds of things school governors end up doing are not for the faint-hearted, require a lot of skills and far more training than the meagre stuff governors get, and can be enormously time-consuming and difficult.

I do however have to agree with RP that the parent governors I met all appeared to be motivated by desire to influence their children's schools (and why would they not be?) and this on the GB I worked with in some cases resulted in the derailing of perfectly reasonable policies because parent governors didn't think them appropriate for their own children. The HT was tearing her hair out to be honest.

[Guest55]

In Bucks all Governors are expected to do 5 evenings of training on key areas of their responsibilities. In addition they used to be able to buy in additional support and, if a school was struggling then this was free.

[Amber]

I believe such training is compulsory everywhere, not just in Buckinghamshire, but I still do not believe that this role is one which ought to be entrusted to the goodwill of amateurs. A former head of OFSTED agreed with me some years back but as far as I am aware nothing has changed since this:
https://www.theguardian.com/education/2 ... ose-ofsted" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Anyway what about lunchtime supervisors? One lady who worked at my child's school regularly sent children who wouldn't play with her daughter into the head for punishment. Word was the daughter was generally a spiteful little madam but always managed to look like the victim. In my day dinner ladies were far scarier than any teacher! They had 'the look' which could make grown men wither.

[stroudydad]

I believe such training is compulsory everywhere, not just in Buckinghamshire, but I still do not believe that this role is one which ought to be entrusted to the goodwill of amateurs. A former head of OFSTED agreed with me some years back but as far as I am aware nothing has changed since this:
https://www.theguardian.com/education/2 ... ose-ofsted" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Anyway what about lunchtime supervisors? One lady who worked at my child's school regularly sent children who wouldn't play with her daughter into the head for punishment. Word was the daughter was generally a spiteful little madam but always managed to look like the victim. In my day dinner ladies were far scarier than any teacher! They had 'the look' which could make grown men wither.

I think it's the term 'lunchtime supervisor' that appeals to many, some form of control/superiority. Mine have always been told to be polite but generally sort their own playground problems out.

[Amber]

I think it's the term 'lunchtime supervisor' that appeals to many, some form of control/superiority.

I must confess to a very non-PC family joke in the past, when we were wondering what kind of uniform would have been appropriate for this person. She already had precision-cut (what we called 'sharpened') hair, the colour of welded steel, and we had a few ideas on the type of military uniform which would have set the look off.

[loobylou]

I've not met parent governors of the type described though I do agree that some are motivated by attempting to influence things in a way which would benefit their own children.
I stood as governor for the very specific reason that the other person who was standing was a manipulative unpleasant person who would have destroyed the head and any chance of his being able to cope as he moved towards retirement. I stood purely in order to try and help him as best as I could because I knew that we needed him to retire properly and not under a cloud because it was going to be enormously difficult to attract another good candidate to the school (as proved to be the case when he did retire).
However I was very conscious that my children were potentially treated differently (I had absolutely no idea that governor status was a *thing* before I stood - nor how much work was involved!) and there were moments of awkwardness when I felt that they were given more reward then they should have been...

[RedPanda]

Parents tend to become governors because of a vested interest in their own children. I've seen a few (by no means the majority) cross the line in my time and have no shame about it. Beware the 'helicopter parent' governors is what I say.

+1
I have also seen this when I was working with a governing body once (not my own children's school). Nightmare interference with things like homework policy.

I think this is rather unfair on the parents who give up time and effort using professional skills and first hand experience to work for the benefit of all the pupils and staff.
There may be those who take on the role for selfish reasons but for those who take the role responsibly it is hard work and can be extremely stressful.

There are some 'good' parent governors for sure. How is it stressful though KB? Unless you are counting the effects of caffeine.

[Reading Mum]

I would try the role of Governor and then you would understand where the stress comes from. I have been a Governor at 2 different schools and it is a lot of work and a lot of responsibility (if you take it seriously). One head, at my interview, spent a great amount of time on the fact that you had to ‘leave your child at the door’ and act in the best interests of the whole school. If you could not do that it would be better if you didn’t take up the role. DD has seen no evidence that teachers knew I was a Governor- I certainly wouldn’t have dreamed of playing that card in respect of anything to do with her education/treatment.