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Health & Safety: The Governance Role

At a glance

Health and safety is one of the board's most important responsibilities, but effective governance is about far more than policies and compliance. This highly interactive course explores how governors and trustees can provide confident strategic oversight, ask the right questions, gain assurance and support a positive safety culture through realistic scenarios, practical examples and proportionate approaches.

By the end of this course, you will be able to:

Understand the board's strategic responsibilities within the key health and safety legal and regulatory framework.
Distinguish between governance, strategic oversight and operational management of health and safety.
Ask effective questions and use evidence to gain assurance that health and safety is being managed well.
Recognise common governance pitfalls and respond confidently to realistic health and safety scenarios.
Understand how risk management, safeguarding, estates, educational visits and wellbeing contribute to effective health and safety governance.
Identify practical actions that will strengthen health and safety oversight in their own school or trust.
Online via Zoom
2 hour session

about this course

Who is this suitable for?

Those who need to better understand how to govern in this area; this may include

  • Governors of maintained schools
  • Trustees from single and multi-academy trusts
  • Governors or trustees with a specific lead responsibility for H&S
  • Governance professionals

about this course

What are the benefits?

  • Govern with confidence by understanding exactly what effective health and safety oversight looks like.
  • Ask better questions that provide meaningful assurance without straying into operational management.
  • Learn from realistic scenarios that bring governance challenges to life and build confidence in decision-making.
  • Take away practical ideas and tools that can be applied immediately to strengthen governance and promote a positive culture of safety.

about this course

How will you learn?

  • The workshop blends facilitator-led discussion with interactive activities, real-world scenarios and examples of good practice.
  • You’ll be able to share challenges you face with your peers and explore tried and tested approaches and solutions
  • You'll leave with a resource toolkit and ready-to-use templates to help with next steps and implementation.

Upcoming cohorts

Costs

NGA membership offers you substantial savings on this course and access to much more and there are discounts for group bookings.

Costs for members

£90
per person

Group discounts

£80
2-4 people
£70
5+ people
Browse upcoming cohorts

Costs for non-members

£110
per person

Group discounts

£95
2-4 people
£85
5+ people
Browse upcoming cohorts

Meet the trainer

Peter Sharp

Peter works with schools and trusts through carrying out reviews of governance and delivering training. He works with trust boards, governing bodies and governance professionals across different types of schools including primary and secondary phases in MATs and the maintained sector. He has been involved in school governance as a school leader, maintained school governor and chair and MAT trustee. Peter has been involved in education since 2005, working as a school leader and then as an independent consultant supporting schools, trust boards and governing bodies. He also works as a reporting inspector for the Independent Schools Inspectorate. In this work he has gained a thorough understanding of the regulations and best practice, especially in areas such as safeguarding, health and safety and premises. Peter has experience across a wide range of settings and adapts his approach to provide bespoke support to the organisation he is working with.

Expertise you can trust

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