leadership - Doubled Up

I am soooo dumb! I've put one or two scams that we have been warned about onto this blog. I even went as far as asking our Head of Governors if she thought it was worth informing the school's Head about one of them. She responded that she didn't think that the Head was niaive enough to fall for anything like that. Because I'm so worried about rocking the boat and being a pain, I accepted this. Anyway, we've got an email this week from the Head saying that the driveway was retarmaced this holiday because there was someone repairing the road outside and they had some left-over tarmac. Turns out that they "had extra tarmac, so they did a lot more of the drive than they had already agreed". It also cost four times more than was agreed. My internet connection has been somewhat shaky this week, so I came to the message after four or five governors had replied "Oh, don't worry, am sure it looks nice" and "it needed doing anyway" and similar comments. My reaction was one of horror, as I've heard of people being caught out with their home front drives in this manner, so I went back to the website where it warns of these scams. Sure enough, this was the first scam that they reported on! Apparently laws have changed which makes it hard for these people to target homes, so they have turned their attention to businesses.

Now, I don't feel that the Head should be held responsible for falling for this. But I am beginning to worry about how this whole governing body works. It is starting to seem to me that everyone is so worried about supporting the Head in everything that they are forgetting that their first responsibility is to the children. I want to stick my oar in and say that perhaps we should go to trading standards about it and see if we can get some of the money back - or at least report these cowboys to the council. But I feel like I am swimming through honey. Is it really worth upsetting other governors and our Head over something that is done and dusted? Or by not saying anything am I doing the kids a disservice and being an ineffective governor (like, it seems, many of my colleagues).

My heart goes out to Mr Ball, the previous Head of New Manton Primary who, despite improving KS2 results two-fold and being rated as an 'excellent' leader by Ofsted, has been removed from his post because his local authority deems the school as 'consistently underperforming'. (It has moved from bottom of the league tables to sixth from bottom.) But my heart goes out even more to the children of the school who, parents say, have increased in confidence under Mr Ball's leadership. What does this say to them? "Heh, guys, you may have worked hard, improved, your behaviour is better, there is a sense of community, but that just ain't good enough when your SATs results are still to low."

The way I see it, as long as there are league tables, there will be someone at the top and, surprise, surprise, someone at the bottom. Does that mean that each year the Heads of the lowest-performing schools will be relieved of their jobs? Or will someone eventually see sense and stop judging schools in this highly artificial way that leads to stressed-out children, teachers and parents?

I have heard of another scam that has been aimed at schools in my area recently. Apparently, during a telephone call, a request is made to take part in a survey. As part of the survey the caller requests the name of a senior manager, or of the receptionist so that they can send a thank you. Soon afterwards some goods (such as computer ink cartridges) arrive, together with an invoice. The company then claim to have a recording confirming an agreement to place an order. The advice local schools have been given is to reject the goods unless an order has been agreed and to respond only to say that you will defend any claim in court. Apparently, the company may threaten action but is unlikely to pursue legal action. I believe also that schools are asked contact trading standards if they have been targeted.