Parent Panel

The forum Heart of England Parent Panel exists to enable parents and carers to have an opportunity to learn more about how we work as a school and raise areas of interest or concern. This is a key consultative group that will shape the future direction of the school.

Notes of 29 September 2009 (pdf)

The notes of the April 2008 meeting are as follows:

Reporting and Consultation: Andrew Livingstone

Mr Livingstone (AL) outlined the recent history of reporting at Heart of England School.

Teacher trade unions impose limits on the length of subject reports.
Over 80% of Year 8 Parents who responded said they were satisfied or very satisfied with the current system.
He explained that parental consultation evenings and reports are staggered throughout the year to spread teacher workload.

Points from Parents	Response from School
Difficult to know who has written the report in the case of split classes	We should be able to indicate the name of the main teacher
Some tutors cannot answer all of the questions parents have	We hope that ‘concern slips’ will enable parents to get answers
It would be helpful to be able to see a subject teacher after the tutor evening if there is a problem	We hope the concern slip will help here
Parents would support a subject evening in Years 7 and 8	We will try to implement for 2008-09
Is it possible to have a report for every child who joins the school late?	We do have done this a number of times at parental request
It would be helpful if students who get ‘U’ and ‘F’ grades have targets for improvement	Every teacher is expected to set precisely these targets in planners
Parents are not always clear what the grades mean	We will look again at the guidance we send out
Parents would prefer subject by subject reports rather than a continuous comment	Raise with curriculum leaders
Whatever report system we adopt it needs to be useful to and understood by the students	Agreed
Parents suggested there should be a place for students to outline how they intend to respond to the report contents	AL suggested that we reintroduce a place for students to respond to the report and set out their expectations
Parent consultation evenings are helpful in building the relationship and dialogue between teacher and student	Agreed
Parents cannot see any reason why we do not abandon the timeslots as this is what happens in reality	Worthy of further consideration but we have to ensure teachers are not waiting for 3 hours with only a small number of parents to see

Communication: Graham Bastock

Mr Bastock (BS) explained the reasons why pupil safety consideration prevents us from posting all letters on the www.heart-england.solihull.sch.uk website. We have investigated ParentMail but the costs are currently prohibitive for a school of this size.

BS demonstrated the Kaleidos Portal using his teacher log in. He was able to demonstrate how it is possible to link documents to calendar events. Documents will be available in PDF format so that there are fewer compatibility issues. BS will send log-in details to Forum members so that they can preview the Site. We will set up a Parent Panel Interest group so that forum members can try it.

The parent page currently shows attendance and a student e-portfolio. In time assessment information will also be viewable. It will be possible to post timed tests that are marked online and offer instant feedback to the student, and send the marks to the teacher mark book.

Points from Parents	Response from the School
These developments are very welcome	Agreed
What about people without internet access?	There are about 2% of our students who do not have access, We are investigating free broadband and schemes to purchased laptops. The LRC is available to students before and after school, and at break and lunchtime.
The website needs to explain to parents what the assessments mean	Agreed
Can you change contact details online?	No, we believe this would be potentially dangerous and lead to abuse.

Held on Thursday 10th April 2008

Membership recruitment for the current academic year is closed, but if you are interested in our work and would like to become involved in future email: forum@heart-england.solihull.sch.uk with your contact details.

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Parent Panel

Reporting and Consultation: Andrew Livingstone

Communication: Graham Bastock

Held on Thursday 10th April 2008