Introduction

You can recognise school governors quite easily nowadays. They are the ones hurrying along clutching a large wad of papers, wearing the slightly hunted look of a fugitive master spy. A few years ago their counterparts would have been anonymous, relaxed people who only turned up at their school once in a while for a cup of tea and a biscuit, followed by a short session largely devoted to deciding the date and time of the next meeting. Since the 1980s school governors have held one of the most important voluntary jobs in our society.