Article: School Governors Article Body Welcome to Barnsley's Governance Section Governors play a critical role overseeing the running of the school in the interests of the community they serve. Governors govern rather than manage. A Governors role is one of direction and focus; they do so by performing a vital strategic role to the school. What is a School Governor? School governors are people from the school's community who wish to make a positive contribution to children's education. School governors form the largest volunteer workforce in the UK with around 370,000 places nationally. Barnsley has just under 1500 Governors who make collective decisions and carry out important strategic functions in raising school standards through their three key roles of setting strategic direction, ensuring accountability and monitoring and evaluating school performance. The governing body consists of people from the school's community. Every school's governing body in Barnsley has parents; school staff; and representatives of the Local Authority (LA). Most schools also have community governors and certain schools have foundation governors. What do governors do? Together with the headteacher they set the future direction for the school and decide how the schools's budget should be spent. Governing bodies make decisions collectively on matters such as performance targets, schools policies and the school's development plan. Governors monitor the impact of policies and oversee the use of the school's budget. They report to parents on the school's achievements and respond to inspection recommendations. They hear appeals from pupils and staff and consider complaints. Governors provide the headteacher with support and advice, drawing on their knowledge and experience. They ask searching questions and respect the headteachers position as professional leader of the school. Work is well underway in Barnsley looking at leadership and governance across the wider school community and how best we can work to meet the needs of children and young people in this 21st Century. Governor Development To support the development of governors, Barnsley LA run training and development events to meet governors' needs throughout the year and especially to meet the needs of new governors in their induction (see the Governor Directory below). This site provides a plethora of information including regular updates, development opportunities and newsletters. Click the links below for: Governors Newsletter & Professional Development Opportunities 2012-2013 If you are interested in becoming a school governor and want to know more about being part of the new exciting developments in Barnsley schools -