Our school is in safe hands with a strong Governing Body composed of dedicated, passionate and supportive local people from a wide range of backgrounds, and a Senior Leadership Team who ensure that all CMS pupils are successful learners, confident individuals and responsible citizens. The school is very well thought of in the local community, with pupils and parents, and also regionally and nationally through our work with a range of partners and networks.
At their last visit, in November 2021, Ofsted judged the school as ‘Outstanding’, their highest accolade.
Governors are confident that the teaching and support staff at CMS maintain consistently high expectations of all pupils across a broad and balanced curriculum, underpinned by innovative and high quality teaching. A dedication to excellent pastoral care and provision for children with Special Educational Needs ensures that every pupil feels supported throughout their time at the school.
CMS currently has a full roll of 361 pupils and is a popular choice for parents, both inside and outside of our catchment area. This is testament to our staff, who ensure that all pupils enjoy a positive, balanced and supportive education in our school.
Mr. Tom Weston
Chair of Governors, Corbridge Middle School
How is our school governed?
All schools are required to have a Governing Body whose role is to have a strong focus on three core strategic functions:
- ensuring clarity of vision, ethos and strategic direction
- holding the Headteacher to account for the educational performance of the school and its pupils, and the performance management of staff; and
- overseeing the financial performance of the school and making sure its money is well spent.
The Governing Body is made up of volunteers who, as a whole group, have the knowledge, skills and time to be able to perform these strategic functions. Here at Corbridge Middle School we have 13 places on our governing body. We meet as a full governing body at least once per term but the majority of our work takes place in committees which also meet at least once per term. As well as being members of committees, our “non- staff” governors also take an interest in the areas of English, maths, careers, special educational needs, looked after children and safeguarding which involves working with various leaders within school.
How are we organised?
Pupil Discipline, Complaints, Hearing and Appeals committees are formed as and when required.
Strategic Committee
This committee is responsible for ensuring that appropriate pupil achievement targets are set each year by the head teacher and school staff and for monitoring how the school is doing in achieving these targets including having oversight of those policies associated with teaching and learning. Members also have specific responsibility for supporting the schools careers guidance programme.
Over the last year this committee has monitored
- The progress of the school against its School Impact plan for the development of the curriculum with other middle schools and Queen Elizabeth High School
- SEND and disadvantaged provision
- Behaviour for Learning
- The development of a new marking and feedback policy in order to reduce teacher workload whilst enhancing learning
- Provision of remote learning during the Covid Pandemic
The School Improvement Partner recognised the excellent teaching taking place from the use of specialist teachers across the curriculum.
Link governors for English, Maths, Careers and SEND continue to support the work of this committee.
Finance and Resources Committee
This committee is responsible for reviewing HR policies and ensuring they are followed, including those related to pay, appraisal, the review of staffing structures and appointment of senior members of staff. It is also responsible for ensuring the school is achieving good value for money overall and specifically regarding pupil premium and PE sports premium spending along with responsibility for ensuring that Health & Safety policies are followed and that there is a properly funded repairs, maintenance and capital spend programme in place.
Over the last year, the committee has ensured that the appraisal policy has been consistently applied and that the wellbeing of staff remained a priority.
The school manages its finances well and continues to hold a small surplus. Work has continued in exploring how to create more teaching space as our pupil numbers have grown and our use of small group teaching has expanded. Investment has continued in computer systems with a new telephone system now operational.
The “Milkwell” housing development to the northern boundary of the school commenced at the start of the school year and has been scrutinised by this group to ensure safety of our pupils, staff and visitors. Further work took place to clarify the works required to the new pupil entrance, extra staff car parking and new visitor footpath.
Headteacher Performance Review Committee
This committee is responsible for setting annual objectives for the head teacher and reviewing performance against these objectives.
Safeguarding and SEND responsibilities
Named governors hold a watching brief over these important areas. They are responsible for ensuring the school is meeting all its safeguarding, child protection and Special Educational Needs and Disabilities responsibilities. They also ensure that we have and adhere to our policies for behaviour and discipline.
Our SEND provision continues to be considered best practice and our SEND Coordinator is Mrs Parkin.
How can you become involved?
We advertise any full governor vacancy whenever they arise. We also occasionally need people who are prepared to work with us on specific projects; for these roles we are able to recruit “associate members” onto our Governing Body. If you feel you have skills that we could use on our governing body we would love to hear from you. Please contact either Mrs Hamilton (Headteacher) or myself (Mr Weston) via the school office.