Governors are elected by the Members. At each annual general meeting, one-third of the elected Governors (those who have not been elected for the longest period) are required to stand for re-election.
Most years there are one or more vacancies on the Board. The Board invites parents interested in joining it to express an interest and meet with the Board sub-committee, which deals with Governance issues, to discuss how they may be able to contribute and their suitability. The Parents Portal has an online form, which parents interested in joining the Board can use to express their interest.
The success of the School is partly down to its ability to populate the Board with parents, who have the skills and connections necessary to deal with the challenges of running the company. The Board needs members with expertise in various areas including finance, accounting, architecture, engineering, legal work, technology and recruitment. From interested parents with the skills and experience the Board requires, the Board nominates for election at the annual general meeting as diverse a selection of members as the parental demographic allows. That demographic is changing and so, overtime, will the demographic of the Board.
Each Governor prior to appointment is asked to confirm that if elected she or he will sign and abide by the terms of the Board’s Code of Conduct.
Each Governor’s duty (which is statutory) is to act in the best interests of the School as a whole. Governors are not representatives of parents or appointed to promote a particular agenda. Governors do not involve themselves directly in the management of the School except when non-educational expertise is required, for example, advising on legal or estate planning issues. The success of the School is in large part down to the ability of the Board to work cohesively and interface successfully with the teaching staff. On occasions this requires significant commitment of time by Governors. This tends to occur when major projects are being considered or undertaken (the obvious example being the development of Kowloon Bay) or periods of the year when particular Board committees have specific tasks to complete such as approving the budget.
The Board meets regularly throughout the year; normally twice each term. Its meetings are attended by the Heads of School and on occasions by other senior members of the teaching staff and the Director of Development and Community Relations. At its meetings the Board considers:
· A report from the Principal
· Reports from sub-committees and members of the SMT
· Matters raised by the Parents’ Committee
· Matters raised by staff (via the Principal from the Staff Consultative Group)
· Matters raised by parents (addressed to the Board or a Board member)
· Presentations from staff on curriculum and policy matters
The Board meetings are intensive and commonly last about three hours. In addition, there are ad hoc meetings. Once a year the Governors and SMT hold a day long strategy meeting. As the name suggests this is the occasion on which in depth thought is given to the medium and long term development of the School and the major issues that it faces.
As has been mentioned earlier, the Board has various sub-committees. There are four which meet once or twice a term to deal with Finance, Estate Planning, Development and Governance (see links below for more detail).
The Board holds a meeting (in addition to the annual general meeting explained in the next section) to which all parents are invited sometime in the final term of each academic year to give parents an opportunity to discuss issues of general interest to the School community. In addition, Governors attend social events for new parents, which serve as an opportunity for Governors to introduce themselves and their role. Governors seek to attend many of the major School events during the year including informal staff events.
Questions can be sent to the Board.