Scottish Parent Teacher Council

Backchat Newsletter - Issue 91 - June 2006

In this issue

Parent Council - latest news
Contraband chocolate
SPTC Conference
Scottish Food Fortnight
Survey – deadline extended

Parental Involvement Bill becomes law >The Parental Involvement Bill has been passed. It completed its passage through Parliament on 10 th May and now awaits Royal Assent sometime over the summer. The proposed parent councils will come into being at the start of the school session in 2007 with the coming “transition” year giving PTAs, school boards and all parents time to work out what they would like to see happening at their school. For their part, local authorities will be required to help this process and work with parents as they develop strategies for parental involvement.
What does the legislation do? The Bill recognises all the parents at the school as forming a parent forum and then enables this parent forum to set up a smaller body – a parent council – to run affairs on behalf of the whole parent body. Parents do not have to set up a parent council and, in small schools, the full parent forum could act as the parent council.
Who will be on the parent council? In general the parent council will consist of parents with children at the school and the person who chairs the council must always be such a parent. The headteacher has a right and duty to attend and advise the parent council. In denominational schools, there must always be a representative of the Church, but beyond that it is up to the parent forum to decide. For example, they may decide to have only parent members, perhaps drawing one or more from each year group; they may decide to have parents plus teachers and some schools may decide to have co-opted members from outside the school like the school board does at present. Pupil members or links with the pupil councils will also be an option.
Can different groups of parents in the one school set up different councils? No, the parent council will be set up by the parent forum as a whole i.e. by the majority decision of all the parents. Once the forum has decided what type of council it wants, this will then be described in a constitution and future parent councils will have to be set up according to this constitution.
Will it be possible to change the membership of the council? Yes, if after the council has been working for a little while, parents think it would be better with a different membership, they can change the constitution to allow for this. However, changes to the constitution have to be done properly with proper notice to all the parents at the school. Indeed, how the constitution can be changed will be laid out in the constitution.
Will we have to write our own constitution? No, you will not have to but you may if you wish . At present a company called Outside the Box which has a lot of experience of working with community groups, is busy putting together a toolkit which includes a model constitution with a range of options to suit all the different schools around the country. The toolkit will be available from September 2006 and parents in different schools will be able to use it to devise a constitution that suits them. Outside the Box have run a series of focus group meetings to get feedback on their work and the general response is that they have got things spot on in terms of style, language and proposals.
What will happen to school boards? he school board legislation is repealed with the Parental Involvement Bill and school boards will cease to exist at the end of session 2006/07. However, if the parent forum likes the format of their current school board, they will be able to set up the new parent council with exactly the same membership and terms of office. They will even be able to run the election system and call their parent council a school board if they wish.
What will happen to PTAs? PTAs are not affected by the legislation and can continue acting separately. However, as the parent forum is exactly the same as the full PTA membership, it will be open to the parents at a school to decide whether they will have just one body – the parent council – to take over the activities of the PTA and the duties of the new councils. Hopefully you will find it reassuring to know that we will still be around to offer insurance and advice to anyone who needs such help.
What about education authorities? Under the legislation, education authorities have a duty to promote parental involvement and they will have to help parent forums set up parent councils. They will offer advice and may suggest preferred constitutions. However, it will be for parent forums in each school to accept/reject this advice in whole or in part.
What will parent councils do? The over-riding aim of the parent councils is to help the school operate as a successful school. In particular they will have an important role in improving links between parents and the school. They can ensure that parents get the information they need and that the school management gets feedback on parents' views. The parent council can discuss any issue that's of interest to parents, including things like school policies on bullying, school uniform, head lice or drugs education. They might discuss the headteacher's proposals to change the timetable or class organisation. They might work jointly with the school to set up extra curricular activities and homework clubs. The parent council can also represent parents' views to the education authority and others on those issues that are of concern to parents, pupils and staff. And, of course, the parent council may take on those social and fundraising activities currently run by the PTA.
All spelt out like that, it sounds a bit daunting, but the parent council doesn't have to do everything all the time. As at present, with both the PTA and school board, it will focus on one or two activities at any one time. However it is important for the council to know that it can be involved in this wide range of activities. Probably, its most important job will always be to ensure that there is a good link between the parent forum and the school and that there is good communication all the way round.
< And finally To find out more, come to our annual conference on November 18 th in Moray House, Edinburgh University .

Parent Councils Explained

Parent Forums, Parent Councils, Toolkits, Constitutions, come and find out what it all means and what it will mean for your school. We plan information sessions and workshops around the toolkit.

Date : 18 th November 2006
Time : Registration from 9.30 for 10.00 am start.
Venue : Moray House Campus, Holyrood Road , Edinburgh
Format : Information sessions and workshops with Celia Burn and Gillian Strachan, field officers responsible for development work on the parent councils
The cost is Ł7.50 for any delegate from an SPTC member organisation and Ł5.00 if more than one person comes from the same organisation. (Non members pay Ł20)

The fee includes the conference plus morning coffee and lunch, guaranteed totally delicious

Registration forms will be sent out in August

Directors Wanted As always come our AGM in November, we will be looking for volunteers to become SPTC directors. Nomination forms will be sent out in August, but if you think you might be interested and want to know what's involved, contact us now.

Enterprise trumps healthy eating! The Executive has recently announced plans to give statutory backing to its proposals in Hungry for Success to improve school meals. This will make it a legal duty for local authorities to observe recommended nutritional standards. The Executive also proposes to ban junk food including crisps, sweets and fizzy drinks. In general these measures have been given a warm welcome by parents. However from south of the Border comes evidence that youngsters might not be quite so enthusiastic about the proposed changes but that lessons in enterprise education have been well learnt!

Psst…wanna buy some chocolate?

SPTC have always maintained that it is far better to teach children to make healthy choices rather than impose an all-out ban; if you ban something it just makes it more attractive to youngsters. It would seem we are right as there is now an emerging market in confectionary contraband with (mainly) boys sneaking pockets full of chewy sweets, salty snacks, fizzy drinks, etc into schools and selling them to fellow pupils at knock-down prices. Apparently some are even buying products straight from wholesalers so that they can be sold cheaply. As one satisfied customer said, “Even if the school started selling those things again, we'd still buy from these boys as they're not so expensive.” However, it would seem that there is nothing new under the sun.

One responsible adult, asked to comment on this playground enterprise, said that in his day the problem was “hard” toilet paper. He used to take toilet rolls from home and sell them on for 10p a sheet. No, his name was not Richard Branson but it is good to know that pupils of today are taking enterprise education so much to heart!

Join in the Scottish Food Fortnight 2006

September 2 nd – 17 th

Carrying on with the food theme, why not get involved in the Scottish Food Fortnight which is a chance to celebrate the

excellent produce available locally, encourage children (and adults) to eat more healthily and to reduce food miles. This is the 4 th year of this annual celebration so why not get involved - organise a Scottish “Ready, Steady, Cook” contest, a local produce Tuck Shop or, if you are really brave, have a Blindfold Tasting Session.

These are just a few suggestions but there are lots of other ideas on the Scottish Food Fortnight website at www.scottishfoodfortnight.co.uk plus information on events and competitions. Last year there were more than 270 events across the country – why don't you organise the 271 st this year?!

Please Help Us Keep in Touch

Please remember to let us know if there is any change in the contact details that we have. Every year we have great trouble renewing membership because the contact person has changed and no one remembered to tell us. If you wonder what contact details we currently hold for your PTA, it is the name and address on the envelope. If this is still correct, you do not need to do anything; if it is no longer right please give us the new details by using the enclosed form, by phone or by emailing us at sptc@sptc.info

Survey on teachers' contact hours - reminder

With the last Backchat, we sent out a survey on the changes to teachers contact hours. Many thanks to everyone who has responded so far; we have had a very good response with some really interesting comments. We originally asked for surveys to be returned by 31 st May, but in the light of the interest, we are extending this deadline until 16 th June . If you have lost your survey, you can download a copy from our website www.sptc.info Please note that there are slightly different surveys for primary and secondary schools.

WWW.SPTC.INFO

We have seen a real increase in the number of people who use our website and we make a great effort to keep it up-to-date. It's packed full of information on everything from the latest news on Scottish education to questions and answers about insurance and other PTA/PA issues. You can also download the “e-version” of Backchat and all our leaflets.

“Tips and Ideas” in the Info Shop is definitely the place to go for most people; there you can find our growing collection of suggestions for social and fundraising events. Every time we hear of a successful/unusual event we post it on the site; for example the T-shirt publicity stunt that was featured in the last Backchat is featured t here.

Money, Money, Money

We constantly hear of PTAs who are experiencing problems with their PTA funds. This ranges from how to keep financial records to dishonest committee members – yes, money can be the root of all evil! It's really important to have clear arrangements for handling money, so why not have a look at our leaflet, A simple guide to money matters which can be downloaded from the website or requested from the office.

Printed & Published by:- Scottish Parent Teacher Council, 53 George Street, Edinburgh, EH2 2HT Tel 0131-226 1917 or Tel/fax 0131-226 4378
Email: sptc@sptc.info Web site: www.sptc.info

Article 385 - published on 05 Jun 2006

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