Monitoring school performance

School performance refers to how effectively different initiatives and operations within the day-to-day running of the school are performing against measures set out in legislation and board policy.

For example, monitoring of overall school performance would include (but is not limited to):

Evaluation of student achievement
Financial, asset, and staff management
The emotional and physical wellbeing of students and staff
How inclusive the practices within the school are.

What is your board’s role in monitoring school performance?

Legally, school boards are ultimately accountable for the overall performance of their school.

Boards have a responsibility to ensure the school is utilising its resources in the best way possible to improve the educational outcomes of their students on behalf of their community and the Crown.

This means that the key function of your board is to plan how school resources can be used efficiently to improve outcomes for students through the strategic plan and other board policies.

Once the plans and policies are in place, your board must support the principal to implement and monitor the effectiveness of these and respond accordingly.

The principal is responsible for ensuring the effective implementation, monitoring, and reporting of all aspects affecting overall school performance.

Monitoring and reporting against these plans and policies form the basis of the principal’s report to your board.

How does the principal provide updates to your board about school performance?

The principal’s regular board report summarises how well the school is performing against plans, identifying current trends and patterns, as well as potential gaps, risks, and suggestions on how these could be mitigated.

It may also include other information the principal wants your board to be aware of (and think about) to promote better outcomes for all students and staff.

This report is also where the principal assures your board that legislated requirements and policy expectations are consistently met.

The principal’s report provides an opportunity for your board to understand school performance through well-analysed data, a clear narrative, and recommendations for future actions.

How do you decide what is going to be reported to your board?

It is important that reporting from the principal provides your board with timely information to make good decisions, assurance that progress is being made against goals, and assurance that policy expectations are being met.

Using a board workplanopen_in_new to plan out what reporting your board would like to see (and when it should be reported) helps both the principal and your board.

Your board should have regular discussions about what information you require to monitor the progress of every learner and measure the effectiveness of school programmes, while also considering the quality of the information you are receiving.

Your board should then consider what changes need to be made to the board workplan to reflect these discussions.

Big projects with large financial and staffing implications should be reported/presented to your board with recommendations to consider.

Suppose your board agrees that they require further information, evidence to make a decision, or be assured in a particular area of school performance or a specific project. In that case, this should be discussed with the principal.

The principal can then ensure that this information is available for your board to consider at the next meeting (or another agreed time).

How is this information presented to your board?

It’s important to remember that the principal should report to your board in language that is understandable and accessible to board members and the wider community.

How this information is presented to you will vary depending on the type of information being collected and the different learning styles of board members.

Generally, principal reports will be a written narrative but can also include graphs and other visual displays.

Depending on the data, it may also be accompanied by a presentation by the principal or other school staff.

The key is that board members understand the information being shared and can make decisions to bring the best student outcomes.

Your board should always seek to understand the information reported to it.

Asking the following questions can help with understanding:

Do we know what the information presented means?
How do we know it is good quality data?
How does it relate to our goals?
What do we do with our findings?

This type of conversation helps the principal know how to present their report so board members are given accessible, useful information that supports good decision-making.

Are principal reports available to the public?

The short answer is yes.

There is no legal requirement to publish board reports, but they are public reports and will be of interest to your school community.

As boards are crown entities and board meetings are open to the public, any member of the public can ask to see all board meeting papers (including the principal’s report).

As your board must provide them upon request, it may be better to provide them upfront on your school website alongside the meeting agendas and minutes.

This means that the principal must be mindful not to include any private information in these reports.

Suppose your board looks at data where an individual could be easily identified. In that case, the principal should consider presenting that data differently or in the public-excluded business part of the meeting.

Board reports and minutes from meetings where the public has been excluded are not automatically available, although they can be requested under the Privacy Act 2020open_in_new or the Official Information Act 1982open_in_new.

How do boards monitor special character?

Boards of state-integrated schools have an obligation to their proprietor to ensure they monitor and preserve their school’s special character, as outlined in their integration agreement.

The proprietor’s appointee will write an annual report to the proprietor on how well the school has met its compliance obligations as per the integration agreement.

Regular reporting on these compliance obligations will ensure you are maintaining your special character values throughout every aspect of school life.

What are some questions your board could ask?

Do we understand the information we're receiving?
Has our board identified the information we want and how often we want to see it?
Have we included these expectations around monitoring in our board workplan and policies?
Are all board members able to review and analyse the information presented so they know what is going on for students and why?
Do we know how well our school's different groups of students are achieving?

Templates, resources, and references

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