Become a school governor through the free Pathway to Governance programme

Improve educational outcomes for children in your community

Amazon have partnered with Governors for Schools who are a leading education charity which works with state funded schools across England and Wales to address the shortage of school governance volunteers.

In Spring 2023 we ran a successful pilot programme Pathway to Governance which is designed to give you the knowledge, skills, and confidence to apply to become a school governor – and to be successful in the role once appointed.

We’re delighted to be working together again to deliver this programme to a further 12 Amazon employees.

The Pathway to Governance programme is open to apprentices and graduates and is primarily intended for those under the age of 25.

“Being a school governor was transformative. It gave me board-level experience early on in my career, I learned how to manage risks and budgets, and how the highest-order decisions are made – and at the heart of it all was the knowledge that I was helping to improve the lives and outcomes of children. I continue to bring what I learned from my time as a school governor into my work, and highly recommend it to anyone who wants to contribute to their local community, and who has high aspirations for young people’s futures as well as for their own career.”

Eugenie Teasley, Head of Impact at Amazon.

About the role and the impact you can have

School governors are unpaid but incredibly important volunteers who have 3 main responsibilities:

Planning the strategic direction of the school
Overseeing financial performance of the school and ensuring money is well spent
Holding the headteacher or school leadership to account

A school governor’s relationship with the school’s leadership team involves challenging existing processes to drive school improvement. School governors usually attend around six meetings per year. Although becoming a school governor requires drive and commitment, you’ll enjoy many professional and personal rewards, including career development opportunities and the chance to support young people’s futures.

Watch this short animated video about the impact you can have in a school governance role.

What does the programme look like?

Pathway to Governance runs for two months and gives you experience of just what it is school governors do,

The programme includes;

Access to the Governors for Schools premium eLearning resource “Become an Effective New Governor.” You will be given a month to work through these 11 modules with support on hand for any issues or questions.
Participation in a mock governing board meeting to experience how these work and practise analysing data and asking questions alongside your colleagues.
Support with creating an excellent application and prioritised appointments into a role once you have completed the programme.

Once appointed you will also benefit from other learning opportunities delivered by Governors for Schools to continue your development in role.

The need for younger school governors

As someone in the early stages of your professional career your input into the work of a school governing board can be invaluable.

Only around 1% of all known school governor volunteers are under the age of 30. Your perspective as someone closer to your own educational experience will add genuine diversity and a fresh perspective to the board that you will join.

Interested in being part of the important drive ensure more than 1% of school governors are under the age of 30? Would you like to gain professional skills that will benefit you for the rest of your career whilst giving back to your local community?

Webinars

See webinars

eLearning

Complete our eLearning modules to gain an overview of what to expect as a school governor, along with key elements of the role, including finance and performance data.

Start eLearning

Any questions about the role in generak? Check out our FAQ section for answers to many of the common questions.

FAQs

You can also reach out to [email protected] or [email protected] who are our dedicated partnership leads and will be pleased to answer any questions you may have about the Pathway to Governance programme.