Summary of Office Bearer Roles and Co-opted Roles: Key Responsibilities

Elected Office Bearers

Chair

  • Chairs Parent Council meetings (6 per year) and AGM.
  • Ensures good governance of the organisation.
  • Oversees Parent Council funding applications including managing a transparent funding process ensuring compliance with all guidelines and adherence to insurance requirements.
  • Acts as initial point of contact for other members of the community or external organisations and liaises with other Parent Councils / umbrella organisations to share best practice and collaborate on areas of mutual interest.
  • Acts as primary point of contact between the Parent Council and school Head/SMT, external stakeholders (including CEC Councillors and Officers), wrap around care providers and the local community.
  • Attends the regular Locality meetings (or appoints depute) and when relevant the CCwP and Education & Families Committees.
  • Provides regular updates to the parent community on broad education issues identified at above meetings.
  • Welcomes new families and explains the role and function of the PC at the P1 introduction meeting in June and August and as agreed with school SMT.
  • Liaises with the media (very occasionally)
  • Acts as second authoriser for financial payments (as required).
  • Oversees the production of independently verified accounts in a timely fashion for the AGM.

Vice Chair

  • Deputises for the Chair where necessary on above activities.
  • Oversees ad-hoc working groups / interest groups (e.g. active travel, inclusion, outdoor education).
  • Liaises with Headteacher and other key stakeholders on work of working / interest groups.

Secretary

  • Sets dates for the Parents Council meetings (6 per annum) and the AGM.
  • Drafts and distributes agenda for each meeting to all Parents/Carers at Bruntsfield Primary.
  • Writes-up minutes for each meeting and distributes to all Parents/Carers.
  • Oversees any changes to the constitution as required.
  • Ensures relevant spaces (venues) and licences (digital) are in place for Parent Forum activities
  • Acts as second authoriser for financial payments if required.

Events Treasurer

  • Keeps a record of income and expenditure.
  • Arranges floats for events.
  • Banks the takings from events.
  • Settles expenses by cheque eg reimburse parents who purchase equipment for an event.
  • Arrange payment for funded projects or purchases supported by the parent council/ community (eg playground maintenance, Primrose Fund, and approved funding applications).
  • Reports to the Parent Council at Parent Council meetings.

Clubs Treasurer

  • Pays club tutors and other suppliers eg MUC, Kidzcare, Disclosure Scotland, door-keeping (most invoices are paid online).
  • Monitors clubs’ invoices issued to parents (using online system – Classes4kids).
  • Transfers clubs’ income from PayPal to Bank of Scotland account (online).
  • Keeps a record of income and expenditure.
  • Reports to the Parent Council at Parent Council meetings.

Clubs Co-ordinator

  • First point of contact for parent community for questions relating to club programme.
  • Prepares  the schedules, policies and procedures governing clubs delivery including any safeguarding, health and safety and risk assessment policies, working with other members of the parent forum as applicable.
  • With the Clubs Tech Support, administers the on-line system for club registrations (Class4Kids)
    Supports  club organisers (particularly during registration).
  • Liaises  with the School, other club venues and Kidzcare.
  • Works with other PC office bearers, such as the Treasury team.

Clubs Tech Support

  • Manages the content for the Clubs section of the PC website and ensures this is always up to date.
  • Manages the online clubs platform (Class4kids).
  • Provides training to club organisers on using the tech system.
  • Identifies and feeds back any tech issues relating to the platform to the tech provider.

Co-opted Office Bearers

Class Rep Co-ordinator

  • Facilitates dialogue and conversation among the class reps.
  • Updates and maintains class reps and office bearers contact list and makes this available to reps as well as to office bearers.
  • Creates proposed agenda items for class reps to fill in at least two weeks before scheduled PC meetings.
  • Emails raised issues to Carol Kyle and PC office bearers for preliminary responses, which are communicated to the reps via the Google Doc. Where necessary, these responses will also be addressed or further elaborated in the Headteacher’s Blog or at the meeting proper and, in turn, in the resulting minutes.
  • Liaises with Communications and Events Coordinators to circulate relevant messages to parents via the class reps.

Events Co-ordinator

  • Oversees calendar of events over the course of the calendar year.
  • Ensures organisers are in place for events.
  • Brings together and supervises teams of organisers for running the larger annual events (e.g. Winter Fair and Summer Fair).
  • Ensures good handover and documentation between event organisers and that organisers are aware of any process they must follow – e.g. producing a risk assessment, following cash handling guidelines.
  • Supports organisers as required, e.g. with email circulation, booking licences.
  • Liaises with Secretary over booking the school for events.
  • Provides reports on each event to the Parent Council.
  • As necessary, and working with other members of the Parent Forum, reviews the events offered and the processes to be followed, proposing changes to events or new events as relevant.

Fundraising Officer (VACANT)

The Fundraising Officer will oversee the strategy for fundraising for BPS Parent Council & School.  They will work in parallel with the Parent Council Events Co-ordinator to ensure all fundraising opportunities are maximised for the benefit of the school, parents and pupils.

Responsibilities include:

  • Attend regular Parent Council meetings. 
  • Be the liaison with the school on requirement of funds and for what.  
  • Ensure there is governance and clarity on what is being funded for long and short term and bring transparency of the needs to parents/teachers.  
  • Identifies opportunities for new fundraising initiatives.
  • Ensure the fundraising programme has a strategy, objective and clear annual target.
  • Drive the fundraising strategy, timeline and communications on fundraising.
  • Explore and implement processes and systems to optimise fundraising.
  • Work with school, PC and Event Co-ordinator to plan key fundraising dates.
  • Support the Events Co-ordinator on events, as needed.
  • Review all fundraising public communications with PC Comms Officer.
  • Provide periodic reports to the Parent Council regarding fundraising status. 

Communications Officer

  • Maintains the PC Mailing List and MailerLite account.
  • Sends out newsletters and updates to the PC mailing list as required.
  • Manages the content for the PC website, including keeping the News, Key Dates, and Events sections up to date (Clubs Tech Co-ordinator is responsible for the Clubs section).
  • Uploads information for any PC meetings to the website, including any supporting documents, in liaison with the PC Chair and Secretary.
  • Manages the Bruntsfield PS Parent Community Facebook page, posting relevant updates and reminders, creating events etc.
  • Attends Parent Council meetings, and assists the Chair in fielding any questions that arise.
  • Acts as a general point of contact for the PC, passing any specific enquiries on to the relevant PC members.
  • Works closely with the Events & Fundraising team to ensure consistent communication about our various events and fundraising activities

Health & Safety and Child Protection Coordinator

This role holder will ensure that all Clubs have completed a Risk Assessment and the Tutor has passed their PVG.

  • Using a standardised Risk Assessment template which should be completed by the Club Administrator / Tutor
  • Document that the Risk Assessment has been completed
  • Store the Risk Assessment in the Parent Council Clubs GoogleDrive
  • Ensure that all Tutors have an up to date PVG, liaising as appropriate with the individual tutors
  • Confirming with the Club Admin that the PVG is in place
  • Documenting in the Parent Council Clubs GoogleDrive that the PVGs are in place
  • Working with the Clubs Treasurer to ensure payments relating to the PVG process are made in a timely fashion
  • Liaising with Volunteer Scotland to process any free PVGs for volunteer tutors
  • Acting as point of contact for venues (MUC or School) to report any potential H&S issues in their venues
  • Acting as point of contact to pass any Child Protection issues directly to the School Headteacher.

This role will predominantly involve administrative support at the beginning of the academic year, with some ongoing contact required during the year in case of H&S or Child Protection issues needing to be escalated. 

Ideally, you will have experience of supporting risk assessments, H&S and / or PVG processes. You must be able to work with confidential data and be able to handle sensitive information with appropriate discretion.

Regular Voting Members

As well as elected or co-opted office bearers, the Parent Council also includes a number of regular members. The number varies depending on the number of co-opted office bearers and whether any of the office bearer roles are shared, but there are usually between 12 and 14 regular member.

Like all Parent Council members, Regular Members have the right to vote on any funding applications, and they generally try to attend meetings (of which we have two per term) to ensure we are quorate.

Regular Members also have the opportunity, depending on their interests, to:

  • Represent the Parent Council at community or locality meetings
  • Take a lead on special interest sub groups
  • Deputise for officer bearers
  • Help shape our annual events programme and fundraising activities

The time commitment for Regular Members can be as little as an hour a month, or more depending on your interests and how much you want to be involved. If you’d like to be more at the pulse of the Parent Forum, but feel you can’t commit to an office bearer role, then becoming a regular voting member may be perfect for you!