Review of Governors’ Activities
Dear Parents and Guardians of children at Deptford Park School, my name is Sue Smyth and I am the chair of governors at the school.
I want to let you know some of the work that governors did last year and some of the work that we plan to do through the coming year.
School governors are volunteers who work alongside the headteacher and his team. We help the school improve and we help ensure a high standard of education for all pupils – whatever their ability or needs. Governors come from different parts of the school community including staff and parents and we meet at least twice every term.
These were the things we spent most of our time on last year:
We checked that the school was spending money in the most effective way – we approved plans to spend money on the nursery play area
We set targets for the school for how they would help children learn in Reading, Writing, Maths and Science, and we kept evaluating how well the school was doing throughout the year.
These are some of the other things that we did last year:
We visited the school a number of times during the year – teachers allowed us to observe their lessons so that we could understand how well the school is doing – we are very grateful to teachers and pupils for allowing us into the classroom
We decided on the best way to help children who were often collected late from school
We welcomed new governors to the team and said goodbye to some old friends
We decided on the best way for the school to prepare for the closure of Charlotte Turner school to welcome and integrate new children and their families into our school community
We thought back on how well we had done at governing the school and what we could do better in the future – we also went to a number of training sessions to make sure that we can continue to be effective governors
We agreed the schools plans for making sure all children are safe in the school at all times and we agreed the school’s plans for what to do if there was ever an emergency in the school
We looked at how the school should respond to the increasing demand for school places and agreed the additional provision
We challenged the Local Authority to help us to improve the way the school responds to child safety issues.
These are the things that we plan to do during the next year:
We will respond positively to the feedback and recommendations given to us by Ofsted and the school council
We will advocate for the school with the Local Authority to ensure the best outcomes across all aspects of the school community
We will monitor and evaluate the targets that we have set for teaching and learning – especially for literacy – if the school looks like it is going to miss the targets then we will work more closely with the school to help them improve
We will ensure the school provides for ALL pupils (including those pupils who are more able or more vulnerable)
We will work with the Local Authority to decide how to best respond to increasing numbers of primary age children in the borough and monitor increased demand created by local housing developments
We will continue to work with the headteacher to develop plans for the school
We will keep visiting lessons so that we know how well the school is developing
We will continue to check that the school’s money is spent in the the most effective way
We will recruit new governors to complete the team
We will think about how we govern so that we know we are effective
We will continue to develop our partnership with the schoolWe will develop our page on the school website (http://www.deptfordparkschool.co.uk/meetthegovernors.asp)
We would like to hear from you – especially if you have any advice for us on how we could do better at governing the school. We have an e-mail address that you can use (info@deptfordpark.lewisham.sch.uk) or you can get in touch via the school office.
Thank you for spending the time to find out more about the work of governors at Deptford Park School.
Best wishes
Sue Smyth
Chair of Governors
Deptford Park School