An article on The Stirrer today reports how bewildered parents have been sacked from their voluntary school governor roles only to be replaced by a paid “expert” whose last school was on a government crisis list.
Thelma Probert has been appointed to the Interim Executive Board (set-up to take over from the parent volunteers) at Birmingham’s Moseley School having spent 12 years at the inner city Golden Hillock School in Small Heath, during which time the school massively underachieved with only 24% of pupils gaining five GCSEs (including Maths & English). That’s 20% below the fairly desperate national average.
As a consequence of this dismal performance Golden Hillock became a rather euphemistically named “National Challenge School”. In other words, they joined a watch list reserved for the very worst schools in the country.
What better hand to guide the improvement of Moseley school, eh?
The ex-parent governors, however, have smelt something of a rat according to The Stirrer. The current acting headmaster at Moseley school is none other than Tim Boyes, formerly the deputy head at (guess where??) Golden Hillock, and during Probert’s tenure...
No need to bother Sherlock Holmes on this one.
This looks suspiciously like yesterday’s post about the Chief Executive of Stoke Council channelling work in the direction of his former affiliates. Those with power over the public purse now appear to think its fair game to keep their pals and cronies happy with taxpayer-funded roles and contracts – stuff the best person for the job! Whilst these people keep each other fed, watered, and cosy, the wider public sector is having to look at frontline service cuts and the private sector are battling off redundancies and pay cuts.
Regardless of this issue of patent favouritism, half-baked experts with dubious CVs are no replacement for parent governors at any cost, and the latter have every right to feel affronted by this appointment. They have a vested interest in the schools performance and – what’s more – don’t charge the taxpayer an inflated fee for their time and efforts. The appointed experts of this world too often see the money, not the mission.
And as one parent put it on The Stirrer website, “How can she (Thelma Probert) be appointed to turn around Moseley, when it's already enjoying better results than anything she achieved in her time as head at an inner city school?"
Quite.