Convenor appointed to Glasgow City Region Education Committee
Renfrewshire Council’s Deputy Leader Cllr Jim Paterson was elected as convener of the newly established Glasgow City Region Education Committee at its first meeting in Glasgow on 15th January.
The Committee, formally known as the West Partnership, held its first meeting where it endorsed the region’s initial educational improvement plan, setting out a series of ambitious actions and initiatives to be pursued over the next three years to seek to tackle the attainment gap.
The Partnership brings together the eight constituent authorities of the Glasgow City Region. Each authority will seek to work together on regional initiatives to bring about improvement, complementing existing local improvement efforts by each authority which will continue to be overseen by local democratic structures. Early actions being pursued by the Partnership include efforts to identify, share and learn from best practice, learning opportunities for education staff across the region and the development of collaborative proposals to ensure the successful and high quality delivery of 1140 hours of statutory childcare by 2020.
The Education Committee’s initial meeting was the first such meeting of the regional education collaboratives being established across Scotland, providing Councillors from across each authority the opportunity to scrutinise and endorse the Partnership’s initial improvement plan.
Following the initial regional Education Committee, Cllr Jim Paterson commented:
“The partnership offers us exciting new opportunities to work together to bring about excellence and equity in education across the region.
“I’m delighted to have been elected the Convener of the newly established regional education committee and look forward to working with my colleagues from across all eight education authorities in the months and years ahead to bring about educational improvement for all children and young people throughout the Glasgow City Region.
“Together, we are ambitious in our plans to close the attainment gap. Every young person should have the opportunities to fulfil their potential – working together to drive educational improvement will be at the centre of delivering on this aspiration.”
Glasgow City Region’s Education Committee comprises the following member authorities/ committee members:
East Dunbartonshire Council (TBC)
East Renfrewshire Council (Cllr Paul O’Kane)
Glasgow City Council (Cllr Chris Cunningham)
Inverclyde Council (Cllr Jim Clocherty)
North Lanarkshire Council (Cllr Frank McNally)
Renfrewshire Council (Cllr Jim Paterson)
South Lanarkshire Council (Cllr Katy Loudon)
West Dunbartonshire Council (Cllr Karen Conaghan)
The Partnership was established last year as part of the Scottish Government’s aims to bring about educational improvement.
Committee papers, including the endorsed Improvement Plan are available here.
