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A meeting of the Ermysted’s Grammar School Full Governing Board

was held in the boardroom at the School on Thursday 16th May 2019 at 4.30pm

GOVERNORS

Mr C Worts [CW] Chair (FTG); Mr M Evans [MJE] Headmaster (SG); Mr AM Davies [AD] Vice Chair (FTG)

Mr HG Cutler [HC] (FTG); Mrs J Lloyd [JL] (FTG); Mrs SE Stockton [SS] (FTG)

Mr JE Taylor [JT] (OBFTG); Dr S Humphrey [SH] (PAFTG); Ms S Trelease [ST] (CG)

Mr S Clarkson [SC] (LA); Mr S Flanagan [SF] (FTG); Mrs D Swiffen [DS] (FTG)

Mr A Jackson [AJ] (SG); Ms V Anderson [VA] (PG); Mr A Hart [AH] (PG)

(FTG) Foundation Trustee Governor; (OBFTG) Old Boys Foundation Trustee Governor

(PAFTG) Parents Association Foundation Trustee Governor; (SG) Staff Governor

(LA) Local Authority Governor; (PG) Parent Governor; (CG) Co-opted Governor

TO BE IN ATTENDANCE

Mr D Frankland [DF] Clerk to Governors

Mr A Wooley [ADW] School Business Leader

Ms P Davies [PD] Deputy Head Teacher

Members of the Senior Leadership Team

MINUTES OF THE MEETING OF THE FULL GOVERNING BOARD 16.05.19

GOVERNORS PRESENT

Mr C Worts [CW] Chair (FTG); Mr M Evans [MJE] Headmaster (SG)

Mr HG Cutler [HC] (FTG); Dr S Humphrey [SH] (PAFTG); Ms S Trelease [ST] (CG)

Mr S Clarkson [SC] (LA); Mr S Flanagan [SF] (FTG); Mrs D Swiffen [DS] (FTG)

Mr A Jackson [AJ] (SG); Ms V Anderson [VA] (PG); Mr A Hart [AH] (PG)

IN ATTENDANCE

Mr D Frankland [DF] Clerk to Governors

Mr A Wooley [ADW] School Business Leader

Ms P Davies [PD] Deputy Head Teacher

Members of the Senior Leadership Team

Mr SJ King [SJK]; Mr SD Speak [SDS]; Mrs A Price [AJP]; Mrs H Simms [HMS]

PROCEDURAL

Min Item Lead att

94::19

FGB

To extend a welcome to Governors and open the meeting.

Meeting status::Quorate

The Chair opened the meeting at 4:35 pm, extended a welcome to Governors and to

members of Senior Leadership Team and staff members in attendance.

Chair

95::19

FGB

To receive apologies; consent to absences.

Apologies were received from AD, JL, SS and JT, which were recorded as consented.

Chair

Clerk

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96::19

FGB

To receive Declaration of Interests, pecuniary or non-pecuniary, for the purpose of the

business of this meeting.

There were no declarations of interest recorded, pecuniary or otherwise for the purpose

of the business of this meeting.

Chair

97::19

FGB

To receive notification of other urgent business for consideration at agenda item: - other

business.

MJE: - confirmed an item of business to be brought to: - other business, 114::19 FGB.

SH: - a Safeguarding item to be discussed at: 111::19 FGB.

Chair

98::19

FGB

To determine whether any part of the proceeding should be treated as confidential and

excluded from the minutes to be made available for public inspection.

Governors agreed items of confidential business to be determined where appropriate.

Governors are reminded of the need for confidentiality on some aspects of Governing

Board Meetings.

Chair

99::19

FGB To complete or update as required:

LA Governor Self Declaration; Register of Business Interests.

Register of Gifts & Hospitality.

The Clerk advised the LA Governor Self Declarations, the Register of Business Interests

and Register of Gifts & Hospitality forms (previously filed with the record of minutes)

to be filed in a separate folder in the Headmaster’s PA’s office, for ease of Governor

general reference and update.

Chair

Clerk

Act

Clerk

100::19

FGB Governor Composition and Report

Confirm the Governing Board Composition.

Governor Skills Audit

Update re the vacant Governor office: One Co-opted Governor (term: two years).

MJE confirmed the one Co-opted Governor vacancy. The Clerk advised the circulation

of the Skills Audit to all Governors with the agenda and papers for this meeting.

Governors to complete and return to the clerk for the Audit to be collated please.

Chair

Clerk

Act

Gov’s

Clerk

101::19

FGB

To approve as a correct record, the minutes of the meeting of the Full Governing Board

held on: 28.03.19.

The minutes of the meeting of the Full Governing Board held on 28.03.19 were approved

as a correct record by Governors, proposed by ST, seconded by SH and signed by the

Chair.

To consider matters arising from the minutes and for which there is no separate agenda

item.

There were no matters arising other than business to be dealt with during the course of

this meeting.

Chair

102::19

FGB

To receive minutes (if available) and a brief resume of business from the Committee

Chair, from the meeting of the Resources and Finance Committee held on 09.05.19.

In the absence of the Committee Chair, the Committee Vice Chair provided a resume to

the business of the recent meeting held on 09.05.19:

Chair

JL

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ADW had presented the 2018/19 Financial Outturn and the 2019/20 Draft Budget

together with a resume of the Capital Account position for the previous twelve

months.

Governors had reviewed completed and ongoing premises and site works.

Governors had approved an external audit to the school accounts.

There had been an initial discussion on the proposal to install an artificial sports

pitch to the top field with the approval of £10k max budget to investigate the

planning requirements, to seek planning approval and consider the installation

options.

MJE had provided a detailed overview on the financial efficiency of the

curriculum.

Governors had discussed a confidential item of business.

Meeting status::DS joined the meeting at 4.40pm

To receive minutes, where available, from any additional Committee Meetings or Panels

held since the last meeting of the Full Governing Board on 28.03.19.

The Chair confirmed there had been no additional Committee Meetings or Panels held

since the last meeting of the Full Governing Board on 28.03.19.

Chair

103::19

FGB Dates of meetings of the FGB & Committees for the academic year 2018-19: All meetings at 4.30pm unless otherwise indicated.

Summer Term 2019

Thursday 20 June 2019 School Improvement Committee

Monday 24 June 2019 Resources & Finance Committee

Thursday 04 July 2019 3.45pm Foundation Trust Meeting

Thursday 04 July 2019 4.45pm Full Governing Board

--------

Dates of meetings of the FGB & Committees for the academic year 2019-20:

Autumn Term 2019

Thursday 17 October 2019 3.45pm Foundation Trust Meeting (AGM)

Thursday 17 October 2019 Full Governing Board (AGM)

Thursday 14 November 2019 School Improvement Committee

Monday 18 November 2019 Resources & Finance Committee

Thursday 5 December 2019 Full Governing Board

Spring Term 2020

Monday 20 January 2020 Resources & Finance Committee

Thursday 23 January 2020 *changed* School Improvement Committee

Thursday 6 February 2020 Full Governing Board

Thursday 12 March 2020 School Improvement Committee

Monday 16 March 2020 Resources & Finance Committee

Thursday 26 March 2020 Full Governing Board

Chair

nb

nb

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Summer Term 2020

Thursday 30 April 2020 School Improvement Committee

Thursday 7 May 2020 Resources & Finance Committee

Thursday 14 May 2020 Full Governing Board

Monday 22 June 2020 Resources & Finance Committee

Thursday 25 June 2020 *changed* School Improvement Committee

Thursday 2 July 2020 Full Governing Board

MJE proposed the dates above and (revised dates) as highlighted for academic year 2019-

20; these now confirmed as correct.

The Chair proposed an additional meeting of the Foundation Trustees due to pressure of

business to be resolved prior to the Summer recess and to be held on Thursday, 4 July

commencing at 3:45 pm.

The Meeting of the Full Governing Board on Thursday, 4 July to commence 15 minutes

later than the normal time, and at 4.45pm.

nb

nb

BUSINESS OF THE FULL GOVERNING BOARD

104::19

FGB Headmaster’s report

Current rates of progress and other key information (attached)

MJE presented his Report to Governors for March 2019, which included an overview on

the new Ofsted Framework and the experiences of a fellow Grammar school which had

recently undertaken a trial of the new framework.

The Final Ofsted Education Inspection Framework / May 2019 had been circulated to

Governors in advance of the meeting (and is available on the Governor drive). Copies of

the last / most recent EGS Ofsted Inspection Report, dated 22 October 2008 were tabled

at the meeting for the purpose of reference.

The Headmaster referred Governors to his report and the most recent data for Year 13,

which showed the year group as currently below (FFT50) target. The under-performance

is being driven largely by mathematics and physics. MJE confirmed these grades had

improved from the last report but remained lower than desired. In terms of mathematics,

13 revision classes had been delivered over the previous three months, supported by

numerous subject interventions. Updated projections from the Physics department,

provided earlier that day, showed student progress much improved following the recent

consolidation and revision in the last six weeks. On mathematics, (and with this, the first

time through the new exam), MJE related discussions with attendees at the recent BASS

conference, where many fellow Headteachers had expressed similar concerns.

A Governor referred to boys transitioning from GCSE Maths to A Level Maths and

questioned whether they were encouraged at GCSE to do Further Maths GCSE. MJE

advised all pupils in the top sets were taught GCSE Further Maths and some pupils choose

to enter the examination. As in all subject areas, the School sought to teach beyond the

GCSE specification.

MJE

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Meeting status::MJE invited CW to retire from the meeting for a short while 4.55pm.

---------------------------------

A minute of a confidential nature was recorded.

---------------------------------

Meeting status::MJE invited CW to re-join the meeting at 5.10pm.

Moving forward, MJE advised Year 11, in contrast to Year 13, was performing well, with

GCSE exams already stated earlier in the week.

---------------------------------

A minute of a confidential nature was recorded.

---------------------------------

MJE advised current levels of progress for Year 12 and Year 10 as good. Lower down

school, Years 9, 8 and 7 were doing very well, but the year group targets are relatively

low. MJE provided more detailed information on the prior attainment of each cohort.

The Report provided the most recent Staffing Update and pupil numbers on roll with the

FTE for 2018-19 at 48.8 and the Pupil Teacher Ratio therefore 16.7.

Referring to Attendance / Absence, MJE advised this at 95.0% (all pupils) and with some

good progress in reducing unauthorised absence to 0.7%. MJE confirmed continual work

and interactions in place to support improvement on Attendance. MJE confirmed he had

signed off the School Census earlier in the week, although within Attendance, he believed

another issue still remained to be addressed. Although relatively low when compared to

peer schools, he had been disappointed by the number of persistent absentees during the

Spring term. Action was being taken to improve this issue.

The Report provided behaviour information and included referrals to outside agencies.

Accident data, FOI requests and Data Beach information was provided together with

Educational Trips (with none requiring Governor approval at this time).

In response to a recent Governor request, the Headmaster provided reporting on recent

DBS checks (and in addition, with DBS guidance with regard to Educational Trips).

On a Governor question regarding DBS certification, MJE provided clarity on non-

transferable and transferable DBS certificates and on a further question, clarity on the

need for DBS for the host families with Ermysted’s students when on overseas visits.

105::19

FGB New Ofsted framework

Feedback on experiences of a fellow Grammar School in a recent trial inspection (draft

inspection framework attached).

The Headmaster provided an overview to a presentation both he and the Deputy Head

teacher had received recently, at the BASS conference in Stratford, and explained the

process of the new inspection is expected to take place over two days. Ofsted had

indicated that up to 10% of exempt schools, of which Ermysted’s is one, of those, will be

seen each year.

MJE

PD

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MJE confirmed the variances from the draft to the final document (May 2019) now to

include an initial telephone conversation with the Headteacher and a visit to the school

the following day. Inspectors would undertake a series of ‘deep dives’ and then ‘shallow

dips’ - with the major change to meet with and conduct observations with Heads of

Faculties. Then to meet with teachers and subsequently students, to effectively triangulate

the information from the earlier discussion with the Headteacher.

Inspectors would then open conversations with Governors (and meet with as many

Governors as possible) to explore their contribution to strategic planning and the extent

of their understanding of aspects of the school through the role of Link Governors and

governor challenge of the Headteacher.

Governors overviewed the EGS Ofsted Inspection report from October 2008.

There was discussion about the benefits of the Governing Board partaking in a mock

Ofsted with MJE to enquire further.

106::19

FGB Budget

FY2018-19 performance and draft FY2019-20 budget proposal; Capital expenditure:

completed, committed and proposed (verbal summary of items).

ADW presented the Financial Outturn for the year 2018/19 and advised the figures now

provisionally signed off by the NYCC finance team. Whilst the outturn position had

indicated a surplus for the financial year (compared with a budget deficit), this was

largely explained by a limited number of specific factors and outside the school’s

immediate control. More detail and the commentary to same is available to Governors

in the papers from the recent meeting of the Resources and Finance Committee held on

09.05.19.

ADW referred Governors to the key variances between 2018/19 Budget and Outturn (the

most significant factors contributing to the surplus rather than the deficit) and the reduced

expenditure, partially offset by the over spend in some areas.

For the purpose of the minute, Governors noted an especial thank you to both the Parents

Association and to the Old Boys Society for their most generous donations during the

financial year.

On the expenditure side ADW provided clarity to the variances, to include:

Appointment of Finance Manager delayed

Site Team appointments delayed and minimal overtime

Other savings on staff

Net underspend by Faculties in the year – carried forward

Water charges provision brought forward but not required

Sixth Form Bursary money not allocated

Governors noted the outstanding issues with NYCC relating to the hire of sports pitches

at Sandylands.

ADW

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Moving to the Budget for this current financial year 2019/20, Governors noted the

significant drop in income, in part due to the (income and expenditure) costs associated

with school trips and activities being taken out.

ADW provided a guide to the potential financial deficit in (this) current financial year

and provided the details and reasoning for the changes; the more detailed commentary

presented, and again identified in the minutes from the recent meeting of the Resources

& Finance Committee.

ADW invited questions.

There was Governor questioning and discussion surrounding the level of reserves, with

agreement on the over staffing of school for the year 2019/20 to better enable the running

of all the GCSE options.

In terms of Capital funding, ADW referred Governors to Capital Resources and Plans for

the Financial Year 2019/20 together with the resume of proposed projects and remedial

works and provided the detailed commentary, (again recorded in the recent minutes from

the Resources & Finance Committee) and to include:

English / DT roof

Classroom repairs and redecoration

Sixth Form Block door

Memorial Hall Annex roofs

Fencing Church drystone wall

Sports Hall floor repair / refurbishment

Maths Office

CCTV

Shelters / canopies / gates to Quad area

Memorial Hall – floor / curtains / painting

Perimeter fencing – North and North-West boundaries

Resurfacing of drives and pathways

Artificial sports pitch proposal and planning

ADW indicated that he had submitted an application for LCVAP Funding in support of

three projects, but that whilst he was cautiously optimistic of receiving some money via

this route he thought it unlikely that all three would be supported. Governors noted the

uncertainty of the provision of LCVAP funding, with this being the last year of potential

access to capital funding in that form and without knowing what other applications might

have been made by other schools. Further information was expected to be available

following a meeting being held by NYCC on 11.06.19.

Governors discussed the perimeter fencing to the school at the northern perimeter of the

site (with a short term issue in the extreme north-west corner of the site). ADW indicated

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that he had arranged to take action to secure that section of the perimeter of the site as a

temporary measure. In addition to that, fencing was required to the other boundary areas

to the North and West extremes, in total about 210 - 220 metres of the school site, with a

cost circa £12k.

The Chair thanked ADW for his informative and detailed presentation.

107::19

FGB Use of data

Governor briefing on the use of data within the school, to include outcome of recent

consultation on how to reduce staff workload (attached)

SDS presented Governors with the Use of Data briefing, and the key documents requiring

Governors to be familiar with the School Inspection Data Summary Report and supported

by the Fisher Family Trust (FFT) KS4 School Dashboard.

The significant changes to the use of pupil data since September 2016 were discussed,

and following consultations with both staff and parents, the school had made significant

changes to its Assessment Recording & Reporting (ARR) policy and invested in SISRA

software to support the analysis of data produced.

SDS confirmed from this year, to provide additional aspiration in the Sixth Form and to

ensure consistency, targets were being set using FFT20. The use of SISRA had also

significantly enhanced the analysis of data with detailed reports produced after each data

collection point. SDS also confirmed on the impact of the above and future plans to

continue to fine tune the use of data.

Digressing to some extent, SDS provided guidance on work done over recent weeks, to

comment on the staff work load and revision to the ARR reporting calendar, with a slide

presentation to clarify specific detail of the revisions. With some questioning, guidance

and feedback from Governors and in particular, from Governors with pupils in school,

the individual year group reviews to the annual reporting calendar in terms of consultation

days, data collection points, Parents Evenings and Options Evenings were agreed.

Staff training

Governor briefing on continuing professional development (attached for information)

The Headmaster confirmed the Governor Briefing on Staff Training had been included

with papers for the meeting affirming that Continuing Professional Development had

always been an important consideration at Ermysted’s and, as such, the school had a very

well prepared and well qualified staff.

SDS shared with Governors, a very positive observation from a member of the teaching

staff with regard to the provision of Continuing Professional Development in the school.

SDS

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108::19

FGB Teaching and learning

Governor briefing on the development of teaching and learning at the school (attached)

The Headmaster referred to AJP to provide the Governor Briefing on Teaching and

Learning.

AJP provided the summary of how Teaching and Learning had evolved in school over

the past three years, with the process assessed through a number of mechanisms and most

clearly seen in the series of Teaching and Learning reviews which had taken place over

the period.

AJP explained how the result processes had informed the SLT about the quality of

Teaching and Learning in school and confirmed the actions undertaken as a result of the

QATL processes and how this process had evolved.

Referring to the impact of the QATL process, AJP explained the drive for high quality

teaching and learning across all subjects in school had enabled an expected standard to

be established and provided opportunities to support all staff in developing their practice;

thereby improving the quality and consistency of Teaching and Learning across the

School.

Referring to the Learning Walks, AJP confirmed these as having received recent external

validation from the Local Authority, Lead Improvement Adviser, KL, who had joined a

Learning Walk/s for a morning allowing the questioning from those who were observing

and effectively validating those views – and with her findings reported in her 11.03.19

Spring LIA Report:

“The introduction of learning walks to the school’s quality assurance proceeds

is an appropriate development. The model has the potential to provide leaders

(and governors) with an overview of the strengths and areas for development

of the quality of teaching, at a whole school and faculty level and to ‘quickly’

see the impact of professional development. The involvement of middle leaders brings many benefits, not least the

enhancement of their objective evaluation of the quality of teaching in their

faculty and the questions this raises.”

Concluding, AJP confirmed staff training had become more timely and meaningful and

outstanding practice was now more frequently observed - and in terms of next steps, from

September 2019:

The next stage iteration would see foci extended and external validation of the

QATL process.

The team of observers would be extended further to include all staff.

Learning walks would broaden the range of QATL evidence and cover new foci.

The pool of Learning Walk observers would be increased to include all teaching

staff.

Instances of outstanding practice would increase further.

AJP

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A Governor questioned as to whether any of the teaching and learning techniques and /

or processes had been applied in any of the school’s identified areas for development

(i.e.: the subjects not performing as well as they might).

MJE responded, advising on the support provided to a number of staff and with differing

approaches, and confirmed he had been able to demonstrate progress.

There were no further questions.

The Chair thanked AJP for her substantial piece of work and reporting over the three year

period and in terms of embedding this into the culture of the school.

109::19

FGB Complaints

Summary of trends as requested (attached)

Further to a Governor request at the last meeting of the Governing Board, the Headmaster

provided a summary of appropriately anonymised Complaint and Concerns for the period

January 2017 to date.

The fully anonymised data, in brief, including Formal Complaints, Expressions of

Concern and Safeguarding Concerns was provided to Governors.

MJE

110::19

FGB Link Governor Reporting

To receive Link Governor Reports received since the last meeting of the Full Governing

Board held on 28.03.19.

Governors received Link Governor Reporting from VA, for the link area SEND, the

objective of the visit to: ‘Identify, assess and understand if SEND needs are being met

within the school’.

By way of observation and for the purpose of the minute, the Safeguarding Governor

confirmed the school had made quite extensive investment over time in mental health

support.

Chair

111::19

FGB Safeguarding update

Keeping Children Safe in Education: link

There was brief discussion relating to specific students.

The Clerk had provided a paper for all Governors to sign and date to confirm as having

read the information (as above link) ‘Keeping Children Safe in Education 2018’. The

completed paper to be filed with the appropriate Safeguarding documents.

In addition the Safeguarding Governor had prepared a data sheet confirming those

Governor who had and those who still required to complete the Basic Safeguarding

Awareness, Prevent certification and Safer Recruitment (online) Training; with

Governors still to complete as required and to upload their certificates to the Governor

drive or provide SH, or the Clerk with hard copy.

SH

HMS

Act

SH

Clerk

Act

Gov’s

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112::19

FGB Policy reviews, revisions and update

To ratify the Behaviour Policy – business brought forward from the last meeting of the

Full Governing Board on 28.03.19 (attached)

SJK provided an overview to the background of the most recent revisions to the

Behaviour Policy following the extensive period of consultation and particularly with

regard to the policy appendix 3: Acceptable use for Mobile Devices.

The Behaviour Policy in the revised form was ratified by the Governing Board and signed

by the Chair.

On behalf of the Governing Board, the Headmaster expressed thanks to SJK for his work

in preparing the review to the policy and throughout the consultation process.

MJE

SJK

113::19

FGB Governor support information / NYCC governor training

(all links updated and active as at 03.05.19)

Governor Handbook & Competency Framework (NGA; January 2017): link

NYCC Governor Training / SIN Meetings 1819: link

For NYCC, CYPS / Governance / main page: link

Support Information for new Governors is available on the Governor Drive in the

folder for this academic year.

EU GDPR website portal: link

NGA (National Governors Association): link

Link to Google Form; Governor Training Database:

https://goo.gl/forms/Z1ouELF1UOgySgsZ2

The Clerk confirmed the following upcoming NYCC associated training events:

Governor Network Meeting on Tuesday 18 June at the Rendezvous Hotel Skipton

(late pm / evening meeting).

‘Monitoring Part 2’ course at the Cedar Court in Harrogate on Thursday 20 June;

workshop to develop Link Governor Roles.

‘Catch up’ on the new Complaints Policy on Wednesday 26 June at the

Rendezvous Hotel, Skipton.

Reservations for courses to be made with the School Business Leader directly please.

Chair

Clerk

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OTHER BUSINESS

114::19

FGB

To deal with any matters agreed for consideration under previous agenda item (urgent

business).

AOB: Brought forward from the recent meeting of the Resources & Finance Committee,

the Chair sought confirmation from the Full Governing Board for approval of the £10k

allocation of funds to support the investigative matters associated with the proposal to

develop the ‘all weather pitch’ to the top playing field.

Governors approved this investigative work to progress.

Chair

115::19

FGB

To review the business of the meeting and determine whether any part of the

proceeding should be treated as confidential and excluded from the minutes to be made

available for public inspection.

Meeting status: All members of the SLT, staff Governors and staff members were invited

to retire from the meeting at 7.05pm.

A minute of a confidential nature was recorded.

Chair

There being no further business the Chair declared the meeting closed.

Meeting status: The Chair declared the meeting closed 7.15pm

David Frankland

Clerk to the Governing Board

Clerk to the Foundation Trust

dfrankland@ermysteds.n-yorks.sch.uk

Signed: ………………………………………………. Date: ………………