School Board Chairs Urged to Make Sure Meetings are Minuted

Minister of Education and Youth, Hon. Fayval Williams, is urging school Board Chairs to ensure that meetings are minuted.

“They should be minuted in terms of the important discussions of the Boards and the decisions that have been taken. We have provided for you a platform on which Board minutes should be uploaded, so that we have a chance at the Ministry to efficiently look at Board minutes to see the issues with which you are contending. When we look at the statistics, it is shameful. Not many Boards do that,” she said.

Mrs. Williams was addressing Tuesday’s (October 1) Board Chairs Training Session for Region six, at the Terra Nova All-Suite Hotel in Kingston.

She explained that training has been provided for secretaries, but it appears that additional support may be needed.

Turning to the agenda of Board meetings, the Minister shared that the school improvement plan should be discussed at every meeting, except in instances where an emergency meeting has been called.

She noted that the plan should be informed by the National Education Inspectorate (NEI) report.

“Every principal at every school should have a school improvement plan that is presented to the Board at the beginning of the school year, and the Board should be following that all through its tenure. That is the only way you will know objectively what is happening at the school with teaching and learning. If it’s not being discussed, then you are dealing with things that are not important, because this is the most important thing that should be occupying the minds of Board members,” Mrs. Williams said.

She added that there is a significant difference in the educational outcomes of students at institutions where the NEI report is being utilised.

Meanwhile, she underscored that governance and accountability sit at the top of the transformation in education agenda.

“Governance plays a crucial role in our schools. We are serious about it and so we’ve put the administration behind it to ensure that school Boards are appointed on time, that they are properly peopled with the various representatives – academic, administrative staff, auxiliary staff, community representatives, student representatives and so on,” Minister Williams said.

She noted that Board Chairs are asked to do a lot in their voluntary capacity and encouraged them to continue working hard, as without them, schools across Jamaica would be missing an important oversight function.