Governance Matters: a message from the Chair

The Board of Bushey Primary Education Federation is the Governing Board for Bushey and Oxhey Infant School and Bushey Manor Junior School.

The Board was established on 1st September 2016 upon the launch of the newly formed Federation that had brought the two schools together into a combined legal entity. This followed an extensive parental and community consultation, which was overwhelmingly supportive of the proposed move to federate. The Federation is led by a single Federation Headteacher, Mary Ann Cooper, who was formerly Headteacher at Bushey and Oxhey Infant School.

As members of a Federation Board, we are responsible for four things: first, we are charged with the task of setting and overseeing the strategic direction and objectives of each of our schools, while establishing and sustaining the vision, mission and values framework within which these objectives sit; second, our role is to appoint, support and hold to account the Federation Headteacher. In this respect, our primary regard is for the educational experience, progress, attainment, safeguarding and wellbeing of the children in our care; third, we are required to ensure the appropriate use of the financial and other resources available to the Federation; finally, we are required, and we seek, to achieve this through working in partnership with stakeholders across the Federation’s community: children, parents and carers, staff and all who support their efforts.

We are drawn largely from the community that the Federation serves and a number of us are parents of pupils or former pupils at our schools. Periodically, vacancies arise on the Board and are advertised on this website and more widely. The two governors formally designated as Parent Governors are elected by the parent body, with an election taking place whenever a vacancy arises. Staff governors are elected in a similar way by their colleagues. We all carry out our governance role on a voluntary basis.

If you would like to make contact with the Governing Board for any reason, or if you’d just like to talk to one of us about getting involved in school governance here or elsewhere, please leave a message with the school office at either school.

Alternatively, email a member of the Board directly, or speak to one of us at the school gate, or at one of the many school or Federation events that you will find us at.

Our contact details, information about our backgrounds, our specific responsibilities, and how we operate as a Board are outlined in the other pages in this section of the website.

Ian Freeman

Chair

Bushey Primary Education Federation

January 2023