By Maureen K. RobinsonThis book offers a candid look at the challenges of nonprofit boards. It presents a straightforward approach to understanding the role of the board, tailoring its work to meet the needs of specific organizations, and creating a culture of board productivity that makes participation rewarding for board members as well as the organizations they serve. It distinguishes between theory and practice and encourages boards to explore how they genuinely add value to the work of the organization. Going beyond the hows and whys of nonprofit governance to provide frank advice and real-world examples of what works, what doesn’t, what requires a miracle, and what can be achieved through diligent and deliberate effort. It also offers practical yet flexible strategies that can be tried by any nonprofit board, whatever its current effectiveness.
Proposals for the development of ‘federations’ of schools are due to be announced next month. Schools within a federation will be able to collaborate across a range of activities including administrative support and governance, as well as classroom activity. David Miliband, Minister for School Standards, has made it clear that the partnership scheme, launched in 1997, which brings together maintained and independent schools, will continue to be promoted within the new federation framework.Over the last five years, the independent/state school partnerships scheme has supported projects between pairs, and increasingly, groups of schools throughout the country, so there are now 180 partnerships, benefiting more than 60,000 pupils in over 600 schools, with joint funding totalling almost 4 million pounds. Partnerships are deepening in quality and extending from collaboration to sharing resources.
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The New Local Government Network, an independent think-tank, is calling on the Government to take “a leap of faith” in its moves to decentralise power to local authorities in the UK and to establish a culture of local and regional democracy. In a new pamphlet Dan Corry and Professor Gerry Stoker welcome a recent shift in Government thinking that has seen ‘command and control’ techniques replaced by ‘steering centralism’, but argue that the process needs to go further and embrace a “genuine new localism”:The call for new localism is based on a need to spread capacity, responsibility and accountability more widely to improve the system of government. The authors contend that Central government should take its share of the burden but it should not try to carry it all. They see a combination of managerial and political decentralization as the best way forward.
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