Conference

2008 Safe Internet Use

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Highlights of previous SSBA conferences :-

2007 Developing a Parent Council and Encouraging Parental Involvement

2006 The Way Forward for Parental Involvement

2005 Parents in Partnership

2003 Partnerships and responsibilities

2002 SSBA is fit for the future

2001 Roadshow

2000 International
and published book
available here online

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Workshops
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Parents in school decision making in Sweden

The Swedish school system

The Swedish public school system comprises compulsory school and various types of voluntary schooling. Compulsory school includes compulsory basic school, school for the Saami peoples of northern Sweden, special school (for children with impaired sight, hearing or speech), and compulsory school for mentally handicapped.

Voluntary schools comprise upper secondary school, municipal adult education and education for mentally handicapped adults.

Local boards with parental majority

In March 1996 the Swedish Parliament decided that during a five year trial period the municipality could establish a local governing body in the nine year compulsory school and schools for those with learning difficulties. The trials are to take place between 15 July 1996 and 30 June 2001. The National Agency for Education has been assigned to evaluate these trials. During the trial period the Local Education Authority may delegate some of the responsibilities and decision making functions, which currently lie within the scope of the Local Education Authority or headmaster, to the local board with parental majority. The trials are governed within the Ordinance for trials with local boards in the School.Through a change in the ordinance pupil representatives may, as from 1 August 1997, be a part of the local governing body. The headmasters are always members of the governing body. From 1 August 1998, pre-schools and after-school recreation centres are also part of the trials.

Powers accorded to the local school boards

The trials are voluntary for the municipalities or the districts. The local government assembly authorises the local school board to enter the experiment and delegates to it a number of tasks enumerated in the ordinances or taken from the curricula in the compulsory school system, pre-schools and after-school redreation centres. Thus the tasks of the local school board can vary from one school to another and from one municipality to another.

The following tasks may be delegated to a local governing body: to decide on the distribution of hours, to be responsible for offering students a comprehensive choice of subjects, to decide on teaching hours and on outdoor activities, to decide on the school’s options and on the school work plan.

The local governing body has the responsibility for the local work plan, design of the school’s work environment, the competence development for the teaching staff, the development of forms for collaboration between the school and the home and the information to the parents about the school’s objectives, ways of working and choice of alternatives, the plan of action to prevent and counteract all forms of abusive treatment, the development of collaborations between pre-schools, schools and after school recreation centres, the co-operation with pre-schools and with receiving schools and the work life outside the school and the development of the school’s international contacts.

The pupils who take part in the work of the local governing body have the right to receive extra support with school work which is needed on account of their involvement and there is the right to financial benefits for members in local self-run bodies in the municipality. In the school leaving certificate it shall be included if a pupil has been a member of a local board.

Some actual data

Sweden has a long-standing tradition of local self-government and has actually 289 municipalities and 21 counties after the latest municipal amalgamation reform.

The number of schools with a local board with parental majority is actually over 200. More than 100 municipalities or districts are participating in the trial. A few districts have more than 10 different local boards.

About 50 percent of the participating schools have junior and intermediate level (year 1-6) and about 20 percent are complete compulsory schools (year 1-9). More than 90 percent are compolsury schools with different levels. A small percentage are compulsory schools with mentally handicapped integrated and a handful are compulsory schools for mentally handicapped.

In Sweden we define municipalities or districts in 8 different categories. Half the amount of the local school boards are to be found in the big towns, the industrial districts and greater other districts. A greater part of the local governments has a political majority which is social-democratic.

The local boards are presided by parents in more than 60 percent of the cases, the headmasters and the school staff are presiding in about 10 percent each.

Evaluations

The National Agency for Education’s first evaluation during the spring of 1998 focused on the background and prerequisites for establishing local boards. To capture the process when schools decided to establish local governing bodies, group discussions were carried out with representatives for parents, pupils and teachers. In-depth interviews were held with headmasters.

The second evaluation in spring 1999 focused on the ongoing process in the internal work of the local board. The report describes the internal life, the progress and the performance of the local boards. The methods used were a profound study of the minutes and a classification of

the different issues discussed and decided upon, interviews with individuals and groups, opinion polls and even attendance in some sessions of local boards. The main objectif was to define whether the local boards had had any impact on the decision making and the influence of the parents.

In spring 2000 a third evaluation is launched. Through an extensive opinion poll the evaluation is supposed to find out if the trials have led the parents to a wider and deeper participation in the school lives of their childen.

The future

If the three evaluations show that the decision power for the parents and the pupils has increased when working through a local board, it is reasonable to assume that the government will make possible a continuation for the local boards. That could be done by prolongating the trials or by changing the ordinance for the compulsory school, including the possibility to have a local board in each school.

Parental participation and decision making have come to stay.

John Evertsson – National Agency for Education

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