Minutes of the Governing Body meeting held at Coldfall Primary School

Thursday 28 September 2017

Part 1

1  Apologies for absence

Apologies had been received and were accepted from Philippa Brewin and leave of absence for this term was granted.

2  Election of Chair and Vice Chair

Dan Walker and Amanda Sklar nominated Laura Butterfield as Chair. LB was duly elected as Chair.

Monte Jacobson was nominated by FJ and seconded by ED as Vice Chair.

The GB agreed to remain on the same committees as the previous term.

3 Minutes of the meeting held on 13 July 2017 and matters arising

The minutes were agreed as an accurate record of the meeting.

Consideration will be given to a parents’ meeting to discuss school budget.

The “Mathematics Teaching in Singapore” report was discussed briefly.

Governors were reminded to write a short profile for the website if they have not done so already.

4 Head Teacher’s report

The “Life at Coldfall” video was shown.

ED then gave a verbal report:

·  Positive start to the school year with happy children, keen GTAs and NQTs.

·  We have over 30 children in nursery and 16 are using the extended day provision.

·  Our school foci are specific pupil groups (BMEs and Disadvantaged Pupils) especially developing language and oracy. Very focused on reducing the attainment gap.

·  Destination reader – whole class reading and using new vocabulary. Will Desborough commented that it is a positive, effective tool using modelling and resulting in rapid progress.

·  Each curriculum team has come up with a research question which they will then include in their teaching on a trial basis and assess the impact. CITs will produce an end of year report.

·  Alex Saperstein presented a “nugget” regarding attendance and punctuality. The emphasis was on reminding staff to speak positively to the child, remembering their lateness is unlikely to be their fault, which would result in a more positive learning day for the child.

·  The new SEF was discussed.

·  SPP Peer reviews were discussed.

Questions and comments were invited from Governors. Points raised:

Andrew Pearson asked if there would be training for parents regarding Destination Reader. This would be discussed later on once teachers have had all necessary training.

5 Committee TORs

The committee Terms of Reference were agreed by the GB.

The correct Asset Disposal Register was distributed and agreed by the GB.

GB were issued with sample extracts of the ICT Asset and Non ICT Asset Registers - these were inspected and approved.

The Finance Scheme Delegation was discussed AP questioned point 8 – where was the amount set?

Point 14 was removed in copy – clerk agreed to send a copy by email to all Governors.

6 Safeguarding

KR (AHT, SENCO) will give a training session for the GB on 7 December 2017 at 6pm.

Article regarding Safeguarding was enclosed with the papers.

7 Governors in School Day

The GB agreed which year group each Governor will be visiting. The timetable will be updated and distributed to YTLs by the clerk.

8 Nursery

The new arrangements for nursery are going well.

9 AOB

Social Media

Social media has become a big issue for the school. Staff members have been named by parents on social media and which has necessitated ED spending a lot of time looking into and resolving these issues.

A revised Home School Agreement has been sent which states: “Never use social media to discuss concerns about the school or associated individual but speak directly to a relevant member of staff.”

The Care and Share Facebook page was mentioned. This was set up as a community resource to share ideas and for parents to help one another but it seems it is not always being used constructively. ED said she would contact Josie Dobrin regarding this.

Trips into central London

The GB unanimously agreed that school should resume organising trips into central London. This would be reversed if the security threat level was raised to ‘critical’ again. Information regarding this will be put in next months’ Headlines.