LONDON BOROUGH OF WALTHAM FOREST

MINUTES

of the

GOVERNING BOARD OF GWYN JONES PRIMARY SCHOOL

Meeting held on Wednesday 26th April 2017

Present: Ms Toni Moore (Head teacher)

Mrs Nicola McEwen (Chair)

Ms Ellie Barton

Mr Ben Bradley

Mr Nick Cromwell

Mr Sumit Srivastava

Ms Charly Hutson

Mrs Jaswinder Dhanda

In attendance: Mr Simon Craner (Associate Member and School Business Manager)

Mrs G Neil (Clerk, NPW)

Questions are in italics

The meeting started at 7.38pm

352. Apologies for Absence

Apologies were received and condoned from Mr Pay Hayes, Ms Ann McNally and Ms Sanam Hussain.

353. Declarations of Interest

There were no declarations of interest. The Head teacher (HT) informed the meeting that new pecuniary interest forms needed to be completed before the end of the meeting.

354. Constitution

a) Expiration of Terms of Office

The governors noted that the terms of office for Mrs Nicola McEwen would expire on 23rd June 2017. Mrs McEwen confirmed that she will stand for re-election. The count of votes is due to take place before the away day on 12th July.

355. Minutes of the Meeting Held on 8th March 2017

The minutes of the meeting held on 8th March, copies of which had been circulated to all Governors, were agreed and signed by the Chair, subject to the following corrections:

Min 343 - Paragraph four on page six should read: '....high attainers with poor progress...'

Min 347 - The words 'become more' should be deleted from the first sentence of paragraph two.

Min 348 - The last sentence should read: 'Ms Barton would be attending a Forum for Safeguarding Links.'

Matters Arising

Min 341 - The HT explained that the £15,000 that could be claimed back for the apprenticeship levy, would be given back in training credits and could not be used to pay the salary to the apprentice.

Min 341 - Mr Bradley informed the meeting that Google drive is working well. He is to email a link to the governors.

ACTION: Mr Bradley is to email the governors with a link to the Google drive.

ACTION: All governors are to ensure that visit forms are completed and submitted.

Min 343 - The HT reported that the list of services had not been published yet. She had met with the EWO and draft objectives had been completed.

Min 343 - The HT had not added a row in the KS2 data showing the number of pupils predicted to not meet the expected target, as targets are not clear yet. She has included a generalisation.

Min 343 - Prior attainment and nursery progress data had been included in the report.

Min 343 - Feedback on the new progress and attainment criteria had not been gathered from the last coffee morning, as the theme had been SEN and it would not have been appropriate. The meeting discussed methods and changes to help encourage more people to attend the coffee mornings. The Children, Family and Community Committee are to look into it after the SATs.

Min 345 - It was agreed that the five year plan needs time for a longer discussion. It had been included on the agenda for the away day.

Min 346 Action - Mr Bradley had updated the school visit forms. It was suggested that governors hand them back in as they leave the visit.

Min 348 Action - The Chair had arranged a policy review checklist. It was suggested that link governors should be added and it should be uploaded to Google drive.

Min 348 Action - The HT had asked Jenny Hammond and George Tomlinson schools about the opportunity to observe their governing board meetings. Jenny Hammond had said they would, but need time. George Tomlinson said no.

Min 348 Action - The school do not currently have a SEA. The HT had spoken to the chief SEA who had said a review of governance was a good idea and had provided a contact. A review of Pupil Premium (PP) was also recommended.

356. Governors' Committees

a) Committee Reports

Minutes of the Children, Family and Community Committee meeting on 23rd March

The minutes of the Children, Family and Community Committee were attached to the governors' agendas. The Chair of the committee gave a brief outline of what had been discussed in the meeting, including nursery admissions, parent communication and parking.

Why is a governor required at the Parent Forum if the issues discussed are operational?

It started out as an opportunity to meet governors, but where most questions were operational, it changed into needing the HT to be there. The meeting discussed the purpose of the Forum and the HT was asked to consider what the role of the governors would be. The Chair asked the committee to discuss the forum further.

Can parking enforcement be asked to attend the road by the school and issue a ticket to everyone who parks illegally?

The school have asked and they do come. Today, five tickets were issued. The parents complain about getting a ticket, but will be back parking illegally again the next day.

Did all the things that the council said they would do, get done?

The white lines were extended, but not painted yellow. A governor informed the meeting that local councillors had paid a visit to the school prior to October 2015. A survey was carried out and it was suggested that the school find previous correspondence to see if the promises made at the time had been fulfilled.

Minutes of the Curriculum & Achievement Committee meeting on 29th March

The minutes of the Curriculum & Achievement Committee meeting had been included with the governors' agendas.

Does the school have enough reading volunteers?

There is a group who have been trained and who are on a rota. The school would always welcome more. There will be a piece on the next newsletter asking for one off volunteers for specific reasons.

Resources Committee

The minutes of the Resources Committee were not yet available. The Chair of the committee informed the governors that the committee had discussed: Terms of Reference, internal audit report, budget, financial regulations, Appraisal Policy for non-teaching staff and the branding of the school.

The Chair thanked governors for their updates.

357. School Budget Monitoring 2017-18

Outturn 2016/17

The Outturn for 2016/17 was tabled.

The School Business Manager (SBM) informed the governing board that the school had started the year with a carry forward of £79,110 and would be ending the year with a carry forward £148,826. Much of this is due to the school halving the agency supply costs, an under-forecast in grant income and a favourable error in energy bills.

The governors discussed SEN funding and the increase due to there being more SEN children.

The governing board thanked the SBM for his report and APPROVED the Outturn for 2016/17.

The HT informed the meeting that some schools had very high surpluses and all schools are saving in preparation for the coming cuts. Gwyn Jones has an average surplus amount. The amount across the borough is around £11m.

Budget Dashboard

The Budget Dashboard was tabled.

The SBM talked through the impact the cuts will have over the next few years and the HT added that the cuts have an impact on the discussions to be held at the away day and a re-structure is highly likely.

Do the staff know the implications of the cuts?

Not other than what they have seen in the news.

The meeting discusses the cuts and how no-one will know what it is going to look like until after the general election in June. It was agreed that an in depth discussion would be required when more information is available. At this time, raising income will also be discussed with staff and parents. The HT is already being mindful when it comes to staff leaving.

Budget 2017/18

The Budget for 2017/18 was tabled.

The SBM talked through the budget, giving reasons for changes where required. The following points were raised:

·  There is an £8,000 pot within the budget for Learning Resources. The staff will be given a slightly smaller core budget and will then bid for extra. This will allow the school to be sure that spending is linked with the school priorities.

Will having the alarm on the Glassroom affect the lottery bid?

The SBM was unsure, but would check.

ACTION: The SBM is to check if the Glassroom alarm would affect the lottery bid.

·  An ICT survey had been carried out to see what items would need replacing over the next five years. The teachers' PCs will need replacing and the old ones can be reconditioned for the children to use. The server will need to be replaced next year.

·  The in-year revenue surplus, pre-contingency, is £65,698 . Areas of risk have been identified for contingency and money has been allocated.

·  The in-year revenue surplus, after contingency, is £3,998.

·  Capital money can be increased by adding money from revenue, but money can't be moved from capital to revenue.

Is there a plan for spending the capital?

The school plan to renew the older toilets. The school will put in for match funding for this work to be carried out.

A governor requested titles on pages, for ease of use.

The governing board APPROVED the 2017/18 budget.

358. Report of the Head Teacher

The Head Teacher's Report had been circulated prior to the meeting. She highlighted the following points:

Context

There had not been much change to the previous report. A child had started in year 2 who had never been to school before, this is going to impact on the year 2 results.

Leadership and Management

The HT informed the meeting that the school are recruiting for two posts, one permanent and one to cover maternity leave. Recruiting is difficult as the school cannot afford to recruit M3 or M4 teachers. The HT explained the options available: 1) interview the three candidates they have and choose two from them, or 2) choose one from the interviews and investigate hiring an NQT via an agency, or 3) choose one from the interviews and job share the second position.

The governing board discussed the options, the impact on the children and the impact on costs. It was decided that the HT would make the final decision.

If there has been an improvement in the quality of teaching, why is that not reflected in the data?

It takes time to filter through.

Teaching

Two teachers had moved down in the latest round of monitoring. Help has been put in place and moral is good. The school is confident that the teachers will soon move back up again.

How many times a year are the observations carried out?

Formal observations are carried out three times a year.

Personal Development, Behaviour and Welfare

Attendance

Attendance is up and the school plans to keep it high to try an offset the 3 day holiday in July, which is likely to have an impact.

Lateness has been dramatically reduced.

There has been an increase in unauthorised absence as the school are being more rigorous on illness.

The governors discussed absence and asked for a persistent absence chart, with the child who has been in hospital taken out.

ACTION: The HT is to provide a chart showing persistent absence, along with some anonomised case studies.

ACTION: The link governor for attendance is to arrange a visit.

CP Information

There had been one racist incident.

Details of complaint had been provided and the governors discussed them along with the role of the safeguarding link in a complaint process.

Health & Safety

The Health & Safety Annual Report was included for the governors perusal.

Data

The HT read through the strengths, weaknesses and actions for Early Years, KS1 and KS2. In depth data had also been provided. The following points were highlighted:

·  Year 2 is a concern, especially in writing. Both the baseline and the progress are lower for year 2.

·  More able PP (Pupil Premium) children are doing better than non PP in years 4 - 6. The governors discussed this and the HT is to look into PP attainment further.

·  EAL competent children do fantastically well throughout the school.

·  The governors asked why the previously more able children were not doing as well and were told that there was a variety of reasons. One of these being that the criteria for more able is now different.

Is there a formal plan to look after the more able children?

Yes. There are in-class interventions.

If more able is on the SDP, what are the school doing to support teachers?

A lot of resources are available and training has been undertaken. After some research, it was decided that in-class interventions work better for the more able pupils.

The Chair reported that she liked the format the data had been presented in. Nursery and Reception data is to be examined in more detail by the Curriculum and Achievement Committee.

359. School Self-Evaluation Update

There was no update available.

360. Agree Agenda for Away Day

A proposed agenda for the away day was tabled. The governors discussed the timing of the day and removing some break times.