Scottish Government

6 ROLE OF A NATIONAL BODY

6.1 Based on previous research, the questionnaire identified seven potential roles for a national body and asked Parent Councils to put these in order of priority. Table 6.1 shows the mean ranking. Representing parents' views at a national level stands out as the clear priority followed by Supporting the Development of Parents' Organisations at a Local Level and then Researching & Promoting Parents' Interests.

Table 6.1 Priority given to potential roles of a national body

6.2 Enhancing Communications among Parent Councils, Encouraging Networking between all Parent Interest Groups and Signposting to Other Sources of Advice follow in that order but are relatively close together.

6.3 Providing Information and Advice to Individual Parents is rated significantly behind the others. Some Parent Councils explicitly assert that this is their task.

6.4 Possible roles for a national body were discussed at all depth interviews and at LA workshop discussions with parents. Discussion workshops proposed the following main roles:

• Channel of influence with two way communication
• Proactivity on educational issues as well as responding to initiatives
• Early engagement to ensure participation in development of policy
• Consulting widely using participatory methods
• Campaigning or lobbying - The voice of parents
• A source of support to Parent Councils
• A source of information and advice

Priorities from other stakeholders focus on

• Listening to parents and representing them.
• Supporting Parent Councils
• Setting up local authority forums
• Providing information and advice
• Sharing good practice
• Feeding information back to LA or central government
• Recognising the fundamental importance of the parent as primary educator
• Engagement and reaching out to all parents

6.5 The rest of this chapter discusses these headings more fully setting out the views of stakeholders and workshops but using the 7 headings of 6.1 as the framework. Where there was no consensus but only a prevailing opinion, this is reported and the contrary opinion indicated. Only when relevant is a contributor identified.

Representing parent opinions at national level & Researching parents interests

6.6 One of the key issues for stakeholders is that the national body must have as its focus the interests of all parents, no matter whether they are members of a PTA or a Parent Council. The Parent Councils represent the parent forum, i.e. all parents within the school and in turn the national body represents the Parent Councils. It is the parents who must be central to all that is done. Feeding back to government how policy functions in practice was seen as very important.

6.7 Both stakeholders and parent workshops discussed how to achieve the aim of representing the views of all parents so as to ensure inclusivity. It was generally thought to be inappropriate for a national body to represent the views of only a segment of parents. The general view is that it requires ongoing systematic effort to supplement the mainstream (and represented) view with those from other segments. However there would be challenges in this. Indeed some were of the view that it was simply not possible.

6.8 Ensuring representation from every group on the board of a national body itself was not seen as possible. This is of course quite different from representing the views of a wide range of interests. It was however thought possible to provide effective channelling of special interest issues into a national body.

6.9 Representing all groups within the overall parent forum requires considering those who are disadvantaged in any of various ways e.g. by geography, urban/rural, socio-economic group, faith. Different organisations would commonly have their own areas of interest that they wanted to ensure were represented. For some, geographic representation was important so representation from each of the 32 local authorities was seen as key. For practical purposes it was suggested that the 32 could be amalgamated into larger areas. The key point was to ensure coverage of all parts of Scotland.

6.10 This sheer diversity of circumstance is one reason why some say that it was not possible to represent the views of all parents.

6.11 There remains a further problem that minority views can sometimes be heard and not those of the mainstream. Minority views can sometimes be put very forcefully. A balance needs to be found within the diverse opinions that exist.

6.12 The key point was that the needs of children should be the common factor and that this should define the role of a national body. As and when specific issues arise or when problems are faced by several schools (for example in areas which have a high incidence of children for whom English is not their first language), then these might be dealt with by co-opting or referring to specific agencies and bodies or those who represent minority groups. What must be recognised is that not everyone will have the same view and it will never be possible to satisfy everyone but that compromise and finding the middle road will be necessary for a national body to be effective.

6.13 One view was that the national body would need to actively research the views of some parents who were less likely for whatever reason to become involved. This would provide strong, reliable and robust evidence of any views provided at a national level. More vulnerable or disadvantaged groups could be accessed by this means and their views included. They would then have a role to co-ordinate that information and feed it back to policy makers.

6.14 Another view was that helplines and the ongoing provision of advice can be used to collect data and this intelligence used to identify the issues of concern to parents. An advantage is that of immediacy through direct contact with those parents impacted by the issue. It depends on good root cause analysis and the assumption that the parents who make use of helplines etc are representative.

6.15 The advantage of research is that findings can be segmented by differing groups. It is however recognised that it can take time and effort to engage with what is commonly described as "hard to reach" groups and it can be difficult for Parent Councils to put in that amount of resource. The national body should offer advice and support on how to access the views of these more difficult groups. Further, web based mechanisms now have potential to make research and consultation with Parent Councils much more cost effective.

6.16 There is concern that research in disadvantaged areas, which are already the subject of much research, will cause the same people to be approached and potentially duplicate. It was suggested that a role exists to agree priorities for any research programme so as to manage the imposition on the parent body.

6.17 It is suggested that in other parts of the world there may be stronger parent representative bodies and this may be worth investigating further.

6.18 For all that it is recognised as a difficult task, without a national body, how would parents' views be heard? It is important that the parents' voice is heard strongly and it is difficult to see how that might be achieved without some body taking on the responsibility to represent that view. Parents are seen as a group which is under-represented at a national level and especially so compared to education professionals. A national body would help redress that balance. To undertake this role well, the national body would need adequate resourcing.

6.19 There is a role of responding to government consultations. This was qualified by the view that it should not be left solely to government to identify issues for consideration but that the national body should also have a stake in this.

6.20 Informing parents as part of any consultation was also discussed. There are challenges in informing parents about issues to help them develop their own views. There are concerns about potential information overload whilst others argue that it is important for information to flow in both directions.

6.21 One suggestion is for information to cascade through council level to school level allowing local nuance to be applied before final dissemination. The web could be used to ease this. All schools have web access and Parent Councils should have access to this if not at home. Information would need to be summarised for parents. A national body would have a role in filtering/distilling information so that parents could readily and efficiently absorb it.

6.22 However one warning was that parents will only seek information about issues that interest them and will not want to be told what they should know.

6.23 It was also suggested that the national body would require to become the natural first port of call if information is required. Establishing this would take effort and time. There are many places where parents can currently go for information and there was some merit in having a single authoritative place where parents can access information. There is some confusion at present amongst Parent Councils as they receive information from a number of different sources and it is difficult for them to know which has authority.

6.24 One stakeholder advocates a PR exercise to promote such a national body.

6.25 To undertake this role well it is important that the national body is not " too cosy with the educational structures and directorates". It was suggested that as a nation we are too ready to defer to the state. The body must be able to talk to government in a critical but positive manner and not as a client talking with a paymaster. In other words it is essential that, when representing parents, the body is visibly independent of government.

6.26 There was also discussion about the role that advisers may have. There is a danger that parents may defer to education professionals. This can happen at a Parent Council level with the head teacher and could easily happen at a national level if education professionals have a role on the board or committee. Generally the view was that advisers should be co-opted but restricted to a separate advisory group and not form part of the core within any national body.

6.27 The body would need to have some clout. The government would require to have good reasons to take the views of this body seriously.

6.28 The issue of liasing with the press was also raised. It can be very difficult for a national body when asked for a quick comment on a current issue. There needs to be a balance between ensuring the view is representative and having an organisation that is so bureaucratic that it can't express a view on anything.

6.29 In summary, suggestions include:

• Having specific interest groups represented
• Undertake specific planned research
• Using intelligence gathered from in-house advice lines etc.

Supporting the development of parents' organisations at a local level

6.30 Offering advice and guidance in relation to the development of Parent Councils was seen as an advantage of having a national body.

Insurance

6.31 The issue of insurance provision arose frequently. There is concern that it has become such a large issue affecting the development of a national body. Some local authorities arranged this for all their schools via bulk membership of SPTC in the first year of Parent Councils to get them started and after that, it would be up to individual Parent Councils if they wish to continue. Others will still be funded by bulk membership. The local authorities are therefore potentially deciding which organisations the Parent Councils should be members of because of the insurance requirement and not based on the needs of Parent Councils. These decisions have been taken upstream of the Parent Councils themselves and have significantly affected the landscape of parent representation.

6.32 There remains uncertainty as to whether Parent Councils are covered by their local authority insurance policies or even whether they require cover. As voluntary organisations PTA's did need insurance but school boards never did. There is a lack of clarity concerning Parent Councils. Government has provided local authorities with advice on this to the effect that decisions on insurance need to take account of local circumstances and the activities undertaken by Parent Councils.

6.33 Most local authorities and Parent Councils take a cautious approach and take out insurance. Some Parent Councils remain unsure as to whether they have insurance or not. Clear guidance is required on this issue including whether or not they are covered by the local authority's own policies.

6.34 A further perspective is added by SPTC who feel that by acquiring insurance a Parent Council can assume an entirely different relationship with its LA. It allows Parent Councils to do what they like without having to ask the LA if any particular item is covered or not.

6.35 Parent discussions indicated that a national body could ensure appropriate insurance was in place for all. They expected it to be funded by the national body.

Disclosure Scotland

6.36 Support has also been provided in the past on issues relating to Disclosure Scotland and the SPTC were noted by a number of organisations for being instrumental in resolving the requirements relating to Disclosure Scotland.

Training

6.37 Training for Parent Councils is now undertaken to a much greater extent by the local authorities themselves. Some local authorities provide less funding to Parent Councils but do provide training. As a result demand for training from the SPCA has reduced markedly. SPCA argue that they can develop training more efficiently but that they are not being recognised by the local authorities as a training provider due to their lack of status as ' the national body'.

6.38 One of the parent groups felt that there might additionally be training provided for teachers as part of their CPD to ensure that they understand the role that the Parent Councils has and can therefore support it properly.

Other support to the development of Parent Councils at local level

6.39 Other support that might be required includes:

• Training for those who are uncomfortable or unfamiliar with the web
• Development of e-newsletters
• Conferences
• Sharing best practice
• Development of a constitution
• Networking

6.40 Managing forums or online discussions was also raised. But one organisation felt they could present a distorted picture unless they were well moderated. Without this they can easily accumulate information which is not factual, out of date or plain misleading. It can be time consuming to manage this.

6.41LA Parental Involvement Officers currently provide much of the support role but they often have other roles to perform also. Learning and teaching Scotland have a national co-ordinator who works with the LA Officers. There may sometime be a potential conflict of interest with the local authority providing a support role and it may be preferable for some elements to be provided by a national body. Parents also raise issues when they discover that some local authorities provide more support than others. This causes frustration for those Parent Councils who feel they are poorly funded.

Discussion with parents put considerable emphasis on a national body being able to exert influence over the local authorities to ensure appropriate support to the developing Parent Councils.

6.42 There are examples of poor support provided by local authorities and of liaison between secondary schools and feeder primaries being blocked by head teachers. There are also examples of local authorities or schools charging Parent Councils for the use of rooms for meetings as if they were private functions. By contrast others report excellent support from both schools and their local authorities. A national body would give Parent Councils the opportunity to escalate an issue if it could not be resolved at a local level.

6.43 In essence, some Parent Councils feel that a national body would be able to hold local and national government to account.

6.44 Whilst support in all of these things was welcomed there was concern about becoming overly bureaucratic and falling into the trap of focussing on the process while losing focus on its primary aim to express the parental view.

6.45 Concerns were expressed at one of the discussion workshops about the power that a national body might have over individual Parent Councils. Would it, for example, be possible for the national body to overrule a Parent Council? Might it deal with complaints about a Parent Council and arbitration become one of its roles? In turn this highlighted the importance of Parent Councils being clear on their own role and the view was taken that it was not the job of Parent Councils to get involved in issues between individual parents and the school.

Providing information and advice to individual parents

6.46 Advice from a national body to Parent Councils was agreed by everyone. There was more debate on whether it should also give advice directly to individual parents or only through Parent Councils.

6.47 Some thought there was a danger that parents wouldn't initially go through their local Parent Council with issues then being escalated without seeking local solutions. Concerns were expressed about getting embroiled at an individual level and how difficult it might be to sustain individual advice and support. The role could develop to such an extent that the national body effectively provided free legal advice. It is clear that a line needs to be drawn at some level.

6.48 There is also much good support and advice currently available to parents and it would not be possible to provide a helpline to cover every conceivable problem a parent might have. There are already excellent expert helplines in relation to, for example, additional support for learning, bullying or parenting advice. So part of the role would be to provide signposting to the most appropriate expert source of help. However one was concerned that parents do not just phone up only to be told to phone someone else.

6.49 One means of helping is to provide a frequently asked questions page within a website. This might provide appropriate signposting.

6.50 There are parents who can become quite desperate for help and it would be inappropriate to refuse help. The SPTC saw their day-to-day contact with individual parents as a key strength and as a building block of their entire relationship with parents. Both parents and the organisation benefit through deeper understanding of the issues that are currently affecting parents.

6.51 Another felt that the national body providing such help should work closely with the local authorities to try and understand both sides of any issue and learn lessons from parent problems.

Researching and promoting parents interests

6.52 It needs to be recognised that parents have unique insight into their own child's learning, most especially in respect of special needs

6.53 There was a strong view that a national body should be proactive. It was seen as a role for the national body to identify issues important to parents and to develop or investigate these further including influencing policy at its earliest developmental stage.

6.54 One means of addressing this might be to use research. Another is to gather intelligence via calls to in-house help and advice lines. This requires skills and capacity to ensure that data collection and analysis is carried out effectively.

6.55 A bottom up approach was advocated to ensure that parents' issues do get identified. It is seen as important that the agenda is not imposed by any external body e.g. government or local authorities, but is the parents' own. The national body would require to have a lobbying role. It is also recognised that issues would have to be prioritised and scheduled.

6.56 There has to be a process of ensuring that issues are not taken on simply because of who 'shouts loudest' and a process must be in place to check the representativeness of any issue. But it is recognised that it is not always easy to get parents to identify issues until there is a problem.

6.57 Not all are in favour of a national body taking on a role to research parents' views. Either way, if they were to undertake a role of this nature it would be essential to work in partnership with other organisations working within similar fields of interest to avoid duplication.

6.58 Another felt that whilst they would certainly have a role in proactively setting the agenda, they could commission research and did not need the internal capacity to undertake that themselves. Actively researching views was described as a job for professionals and not for a voluntary body.

6.59 The education field has a strong provider interest with very informed professional groups and it will take people who are robust, informed and confident to put forward the parent view. Evidence was seen as important when speaking on behalf of parents and particularly as this will sometimes involve disagreement with the professional educationalists.

Encouraging networking

6.60 Clusters of Parent Councils are now beginning to emerge and this is a key means of sharing good practice and creating a stronger voice for parents to engage with the local authority. Where they exist they appear to be working quite well. Parents who do not have access to these locally are keen to find out more about how they work and how they might be set up within their own areas. Many felt that there was a significant role for a national body in helping Parent Councils to network.

6.61 It is felt that there is no easy means of contacting each other.

6.62 One view is that with all schools now having websites, each Parent Council could be linked into that. This view holds that the head teacher should see the parents' part of the school website as valuable and would therefore support it.

6.63 School intranets such as GLOW were also thought to have significant potential for inter-school communication. While not yet fully operational the hope is that it can also be used for parent groups to communicate.

6.64 At least initially, parents saw regional forums as the route to improve networking.

6.65 One felt that whilst a national body could help with networking, individual Parent Councils could do a lot for themselves. One of the existing national bodies felt that it was not part of their role to help people to get together.

Other roles

6.66 There needs to be some mechanism for holding any national body to account. An appropriate system should be built into its constitutional arrangements. There may be an international role for liaison with and learning from other national parent organisations. Web-based technologies should ease this.

6.67 One group felt that the national body could have a role in resolving the disparities between schools and local authorities or when there is a lack of clarity about procedures.

Key Findings

• Representing parents' views at a national level stands out as the clear priority.
• Key issue for stakeholders is to focus on the interests of all parents. Opinions differ on how this might be achieved. Some argue that it is not possible.
• Suggestions for accessing the views of all parents include:

Having specific interest groups represented

Undertake specific research

Using intelligence gathered from advice lines etc.

• Evidence was seen as important when speaking on behalf of parents especially when in debate with professional educationalists.
• Geographical representation is seen as important and especially avoiding central belt bias.
• Opinion differs on whether this is required at local authority level or whether regional representation would suffice.
• Desire to resolve the issue of insurance provision. The current arrangement has significantly affected the landscape of parent representation.
• Parent workshops expect that the national body would pay for insurance.
• Emphasis on being able to influence LA's to provide more consistent levels of support across the country.
• Opinion differs on whether national body should provide support only through Parent Councils
• Some favour a signposting role identifying other expert sources of advice.
• A national body should be proactive. A bottom up approach is advocated to ensure that it is parents' issues that are identified.
• The national body requires to have a lobbying role.
• Issues will have to be prioritised and scheduled.
• National body has a significant role to help Parent Councils network. At least initially, parents see regional forums as the route to improved networking. Websites and GLOW could all be used to aid networking.