By Catherine Tallis, Director of Business Services
In today’s rapidly changing world, governors and trustees in Hertfordshire play a pivotal role in fostering community cohesion. As leaders of educational settings, we must navigate a myriad of challenges. Here we look at ways to achieve community cohesion through effective governance and stakeholder engagement, whilst also considering evolving opportunities.
Embracing change
Adaptability is crucial for school governors and academy trustees. Consider some of the following suggestions:
Stay informed
Keep updated on educational policies, technological trends and societal changes. Attend training, webinars and briefings to stay abreast of the latest developments.
Encourage innovation
Foster a culture of innovation. Research and embrace initiatives that integrate new technologies and teaching methods to enhance learning experiences. Interaction with AI is part of our everyday lives and will increasingly become integral in all that schools do.
Be open to feedback
Create ways for parents, staff, pupils and other stakeholders to feed back. Use this to inform your board’s strategic planning, school development plan and longer-term vision. Stakeholder views and thoughts should feed into and inform your board’s work.
Preparing for uncertainty
Effective risk management is essential for maintaining stability and ensuring the safety and wellbeing of the school community. Here are some strategies:
Identify risks
Receive risk assessment updates at least every term to identify and monitor potential risks such as financial instability, pupil number forecasting, cybersecurity threats, and estate and health and safety issues.
Develop effective risk management oversight
Ensure comprehensive risk management planning is in place to manage, and mitigate and ultimately remove identified risks. Ensure that these plans are regularly reviewed and updated.
Building strong partnerships
Collaboration is key to achieving community cohesion. Work closely with various stakeholders to build strong partnerships:
Engage with the community
Establish strong connections with local community groups, businesses and other educational settings, and collaborate on projects that benefit both the school and the wider community. Make sure your curriculum includes local historical and community context to ensure it’s more relevant and engaging and helps in understanding broader curriculum intent.
Involve parents, carers and the community
Encourage active participation in school activities and surveys to help build trust. Ensure the school meets the needs of its pupils, with the participation of parents and the local community.
Community collaboration
Promote collaboration between settings in your local area. Share resources, best practices and expertise to enhance educational outcomes. The benefits of benchmarking and external validation with similar schools in your community will help build confidence and educational best practice in a collaborative way.
Adapting to new circumstances
Flexible working is an important tool for navigating some of the current wellbeing and financial challenges. Governors and trustees should:
Be responsive to change
This may involve reallocating resources or reviewing your current staffing structure by considering new flexible working practices and leadership models. Leaders, including boards, need to undertake careful consideration and strike a balance between meeting the wellbeing needs of staff and the budgetary challenges that many settings are facing.
Adapt governance practices
Review and adapt governance practices to ensure they remain effective and supportive. This may involve updating meeting formats and frequency, communication methods, decision-making processes and committee structures.
Strengthening governance
Effective governance relies on strong teamwork.
Work together to achieve common goals, starting with new governor/trustee induction to develop confidence and effectiveness and further support retention, considering the following points:
Build a cohesive team
Foster a sense of unity and shared purpose among governors and trustees. Encourage open communication, mutual respect, trust and collaboration.
Utilise diverse skills
Recognise and utilise the diverse skills and expertise of board members.
Provide training and development
Investing in training and development of governors and trustees is a vital component in building knowledge and confidence to foster effective and appropriate challenge.
Collaborative working
Engaging with governance support providers and the wider community, including other school settings, to share good practice, and considering wider community challenges such as contextual safeguarding, will support the board in its work and strategic planning.
We recognise that many aspects of governing schools – the core principles and functions – have remained relatively unchanged. However, it’s a certainty that how governing boards go about fulfilling their role has evolved and will continue to evolve as schools react and adapt to the ever-increasing educational and wider community, national and international challenges. Boards must look beyond their school community and reach out to and engage with a wider range of stakeholders to build supportive relationships. This will help share the load and ensure the school is at the heart of a cohesive network of support. The board will be helped not only to work more effectively and strategically but also to be nimbler in responding to the inevitable challenges that arise.
If you have any questions, please email us governance@hfleducation.org
