Investing in futuresSchool governance and your business

School governanceis the most important voluntary role in education.

Invest in children.Shape the future.

SGOSS - Governors for Schools is a national charity

funded by the Department for Education to help schools

access skilled and dynamic volunteers who can drive

school improvement.

We work with businesses across England to encourage

their staff to support education in their local communities

by becoming school governors.

What we need is access to your staff’s time and skills.

How to invest.

host recruitment events in your offices

support an SGOSS campaign

more governors with the skills to drive school improvement and ensure every child receives the best possible education.

make governance part of your staff development

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or

or

orallow staff paid

time off

flexibility for

staff to attend

meetings

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Why invest?

There can never have been a more

important time in our country’s

recent history to be involved in

education, and we need skilled

and motivated governors who are

committed to transforming our

schools.”

Lord Nash, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of

State for Schools

“

Your staff could be the volunteers with the right skills to ask the difficult questions needed to drive

school improvement.

Governing bodies often lack vital business and

strategic management skills.

There are currently thousands of vacancies across England.

Invest in staff.Grow your business.

Evan Hirsch, Corporate Responsibility ManagerAviva UK

Aviva actively encourages employees to volunteer

in their communities and works with SGOSS to

promote school governance within the company.

We realise our staff can help schools by using their

professional and business experience, and becoming

a school governor is an ideal opportunity to support

their development.

“

”

‘Volunteering - The Business Case’City of London Corporation, 2010.

67%

Respondents highlighted development in teamworking,

influencing, negotiation skills and hard business skills such as

planning budgets. They also reported improved technical and

professional skills.

had improved influencing and negotiation skills.

71%reported a skill gain in teamworking.For the full report: www.sgoss.org.uk/research

Adaptability

Teamworking

Communication

Influencing negotiation

Problem solving

Leadership

Planning and organisation

Decision-making

Helping others improve

Financial skills

Building relationships

Willingness to improve

Business awareness

Technical/professional skills

.......

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..

...

..

..

.

.

..

... useful for developing this skill/competencevery effective in developing this skill/competence

School Governor Skills Gain Matrix.

Sophie Hulm, Corporate Responsibility Manager

City of London Corporation

We see school governance as an integral part of our staff

development plan and have included it in our staff appraisal

system. Line Managers are aware of the skill development

opportunities of school governance and actively encourage staff

to volunteer as a way of developing their key skills.”

“

of SGOSS school governors receive training in their first year.

85%

84%of those who received training rated it as effective or very effective.

91%of volunteers find being a school governor very or extremely rewarding.

Decision-making during meetings59%25% Long-term planning

19% Setting critical policies

Performance managing the Head Teacher15%11% Monitoring budgets

10% Recruiting and selecting a Head Teacher

SGOSS Governors and their contributions.

Who’s already in? We currently work with 1,200+ companies

across England. Here’s a taster:

Top supporting companies.

Rank

1234467891011121314141616181920

Organisation

University of ManchesterNHSOpen UniversitySantanderTeach FirstRBSDepartment for EducationLloyds GroupBBCICAEWMinistry of DefenceAvivaKPMGHSBCBTHMRCBarclaysPearsonDeutsche BankSainsbury’s

Volunteers recruited last year

15865554747464238373433282624242323222120

School governors work with the school’s senior

leadership team to oversee long-term development.

There are around 300,000 governors volunteering

in schools across England.

A little bit aboutgovernance.

Ensure accountability.Asking the difficult questions and guaranteeing the school is responsible for its actions.

A champion of success.Using your skills and experience to support the school in achieving its aims and recognising good performance.

ProvidingStrategicManagement

MakingExecutiveDecisions

Monitor and evaluateprogress. Analysing decisions; are they producing the desired results?

Establish a strategicframework. Helping set the school’s aims and objectives, including determining and reviewing the educational character and mission of the school.

Allocate and control the school budget. Ensuring the school’s resources are allocated to maximise impact on the education of all pupils.

Appoint senior staff.Including the responsibility of appointing a new Deputy Head or Head Teacher.

Support&Challenge

Why work with SGOSS?

27% 852,852of our volunteers

are placed in schools rated Ofsted level 3 - requires improvement or 4 - special measures.

hours given to schools last year by SGOSS school governors.

14 years of experience - we work with 1,200+ companies torecruit and place school governors across England.

The personal touch - our Area Managers guide your staff through the application process and find them the right school.

Employee volunteering updates, feedback and statistics.

Corporate social responsibility and volunteering policy advice.

Aftercare - we can support your employees’ needs: governor networks, advice, training - if we can’t help, we know who can.

Since 2010, we have helpedplace over 8,500 volunteers in schools across England.

of SGOSS volunteers find a school within 6 months.

81%

1,412

1,868

2,0042,000

2,255

09/10 10/11 11/12 12/13 13/14 14/15

2,400Placement targetfor 14/15

What we do.Here are some examples of materials and services we can produce/build/provide for your business.

Governor with SGOSSBecoming a School

VERNGLET’S

O

Brochures

Leaflets

School Governor Vacancies in Durham

SchoolGovNet @SchoolGovNet BECOMEAGOVERNOR.COM

Primary

Nursery

Secondary

Special

Click here for an interactiveversion of this map

Maps

Posters

Intranet

And...

Artwork

Copy

Videos

Webinars PresentationsDrop-inSessions

RecruitmentStands

SGOSS +SGOSS can plan, design and implement tailored

staff recruitment campaigns to fit with your

company’s volunteering objectives. We’re flexible,

so can fit within your available budget and will

work in collaboration with you to create the

appropriate messaging and content to work on

your internal platforms.

Bespoke company campaigns.

strategy

tracking

media

compet

ition

results

promo

content

launch

How we workwith businesses.

“As one of the largest employers in Greater Manchester and with social responsibility as a core strategic goal, The University of Manchester is well placed to make a significant difference to outcomes in local state schools. With the support of SGOSS, we have been able to commit to becoming the fastest growing campus university in England for placing staff as school governors. SGOSS handle enquiries and match staff with a suitable school allowing us to focus on developing and profiling the programme internally, keeping our administration and staff costs to a minimum. As a result we have enhanced our support for local schools by developing our Social Responsibility Programme in ways that wouldn’t have been possible without SGOSS.

SGOSS worked at our pace, providing us with dedicated support at every stage of our programme’s development; from initial promotional material, to the creation of our intranet and the initiative’s recent expansion into our alumni network. Now that the programme is well-established, we support SGOSS by promoting the role internally and organising recruitment events. In addition, if schools ask us for help, we can direct them to SGOSS and they do the rest, all completely free of charge!”

Julian Skyrme - Director of Social Responsibility, The University of Manchester

“The University of Manchester is a shining example of what an organisation can achieve in a very short time-frame if they fully support school governance. In a little over one year they have more than doubled their number of volunteer school governors from a baseline of 52 to over 100 and counting. Embedding it as part of their Access Agreement has given the programme a real sense of legitimacy and provided a tangible foundation from which to develop. Ever since I joined SGOSS, The University of Manchester have been a pleasure to work with and fully deserve to have won both the National and International Social Responsibility Awards for their School Governor initiative at the recent Green Gown Awards 2013.”

Liz McSheehy - Chief Executive, SGOSS – Governors for Schools

“School governance is an established part of our CR programme and we have been successfully encouraging our employees to volunteer as school governors for a number of years. With over 50 serving governors throughout London, we wanted to do more for our volunteers than providing time off work. So with a little help from SGOSS, we set up our own internal governor network and provide regular governor training breakfasts.

Now a firmly entrenched part of our school governor programme, the governor network connects all our governors with each other. It allows them to share best practice, seek advice on specific issues their school may encounter as well as being an excellent source of information for other colleagues thinking of taking up the role.

Since its introduction our in-house school governor training has been a big hit. It allows us to keep in touch with our serving governors, is easily accessible and ensures our volunteers receive a high standard of training that will help them to develop. This development impacts not only their role as a school governor but also as a professional; ultimately enabling our staff to better serve the schools in which they volunteer.”

Emma Cooke - Corporate Responsibility Manager, Herbert Smith Freehills LLP

“Community volunteering is an important part of Lloyds Banking Group’s engagement programme. Volunteering is an additional benefit for every colleague. Colleagues are encouraged to take at least one day, or eight hours, to spend time in their community to make a difference. Volunteering also strongly supports our Learning & Development. The opportunity for our colleagues to become school governors is an absolutely integral part of this.

At the start of this year we launched a volunteering portal that allows charities and community organisations to register volunteer projects on our site which colleagues can join and then come back and record their day.

We are delighted that SGOSS are a partner on our volunteering portal and have attracted a large number of our employees to volunteer their time and skills as a result. One of the benefits of the portal is that we can encourage employees to volunteer where they are needed and puts organisations in direct contact with volunteers.”

Ian Buss - Head of Education - Key Markets SME, Lloyds Banking Group

“The unique challenge for us is communicating the message of school governor volunteering across such a large colleague base. In particular those working in stores or distribution centres who don’t have easy access to email or Sainsbury’s intranet.

We have multiple communication channels to speak to our large colleague base but decided instead to take a more unique and targeted approach. We worked with SGOSS to produce a simple yet effective postcard-sized leaflet. These were distributed in batches to a number of selected stores across the country in areas where there was a real need for new school governors. Store Managers were able to then give these leaflets to colleagues in their store who they knew, or thought would like to become a school governor. What impressed us most with this initiative is that it allowed us to be really targeted in who we engaged with about becoming a school governor, as well as the personal angle for those colleagues whose manager thought of them. As a result we’ve had more Sainsbury’s colleagues becoming school governors than ever before!”

Stephi Brett - Community Affairs Manager, Sainsbury’s Supermarkets Ltd

“Over the years we have developed a strong working relationship with SGOSS and actively encourage our staff to volunteer as school governors. In 2012 SGOSS approached us with the opportunity to provide pro bono support to help with their forecasting ability.

James, one of our employees, met with SGOSS to scope out the project, reporting back to SGOSS a few months later with his findings. James studied six years’ worth of data to develop a forecasting tool which allows SGOSS to accurately monitor their performance against targets.

We were very happy to offer James’ time for this project because not only was it a fantastic personal development opportunity for him, but it has also allowed SGOSS to improve as an organisation – thus helping to drive school improvement across England.”

Rachel Nicholson – CSR Assistant Manager, KPMG

Without strong and effective governanceour schools simply won’t be as good as they can be.”Sir Michael Wilshaw, HM Chief Inspector, Ofsted

“

thankyou.

SGOSSUnit 11, Shepperton House83-93 Shepperton RoadLondon N1 3DF

E: info@sgoss.org.ukT: 020 7354 9805

facebook.com/schoolgovnet@schoolgovnet

SGOSS Governors for Schools