Meridian Primary School Governing Body
The governing body has four core functions:
1. Ensuring clarity of vision, ethos and strategic direction.
2. Holding the executive leaders to account for the educational performance of the school and its pupils, and the performance management of staff.
3. Overseeing the financial performance of the organisation and making sure its money is well spent.
4. Ensuring the voices of stakeholders are heard.
We are all volunteers and have chosen to become governors because we believe the pupils at Meridian Primary School deserve the best possible education and are ready for the next stage in their learning journey. Our role is strategic and we work as a team to understand and influence the way the school operates and the standards that children achieve in all aspects of their lives in the school. Governors should ‘know’ things but not necessarily ‘do’ things. We have a thinking role, we ask, we reflect and then make decisions. We need to be curious and inquisitive.
Governors often visit the school whilst it is at work. We scrutinise the standards data produced by the school, monitor the quality of teaching through advisors and inspectors and listen to and talk with children, staff and parents. We scrutinise the budget on behalf of Central Government to ensure our funds give the community we serve good value for money. We welcome scrutiny of our own work by staff, parents and agencies such as the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Local Authority.
We are led by a Chair and Vice Chair and supported by a Clerk. Parent governors are elected by all the parents and other ‘co-opted’ governors by the governors themselves. We also have one Local Authority governor.
We are always interested in hearing from potential new governors, especially in 2022-3, as the term of office for several long-standing governors comes to an end. Please contact chair@meridian.cambs.sch.uk or clerk@meridian.cambs.sch.uk to find out more details about becoming a governor.
We are very proud of the staff and the pupils and delighted to show you our latest Ofsted report which you will find on our website under 'Ofsted'.
Constitution and Structure 2022-2023
We have a total of 12 Governors on our Governing Body.
We have established the following Committees:
• Finance, Premises and Personnel and Communication (FPPC)
• Standards Committee (SC)
Please see below for a breakdown of the Governing body and committees:
Name | Type of Governor | Committee / Role |
Carole Etchie | Ex-officio | Headteacher |
Mel Collins | Co-opted | Chair of Governors FGB |
Cathy Swift | Co-opted | Vice Chair FGB |
Caroline Mulderij | Co-opted | SC (Chair) |
Jasmina Choukair | Parent | SC |
Emma Cox | Parent | FPPC |
Sarah Yates | Parent | FPPC |
Debbie Jack | Associate Member | SC |
Kate Edwards | Co-opted | FPPC |
Wayne Laramee | LA Governor | FPPC |
Jenny Weston | Staff | SC |
Vicki Scott | Parent | SC |
Ioan Milosevic | Co-opted | SC |
Iris Considine | Clerk from March 2023 |
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The Term of office for all Governors (other than the Headteacher) is four years. Co-opted governors are elected by the Governing Body. Parent Governors are elected by the parents of the Meridian Primary School. Staff governors are elected by the staff. The Local Authority governor is confirmed by the Local Authority.
Associate Members of the governing board
Debbie Jack and Kate Edwards
Debbie and Kate do not have voting rights.
Past Governors
The following have now stepped down as governors or reached the end of their term:
Name | Type of Governor | Appointed | Resigned |
Kathy Talbot | Parent | November 2018 | November 2022 |
Peter Newton | LA | April 2016 | October 2022 |
Yogendra Parmar | Co-opted | December 2020 | February 2022 |
Anna Edwards | Parent | February 2017 | December 2021 |
Rebecca Sands | Staff | November 2018 | July 2021 |
Jude Brown | Parent | February 2017 | February 2021 |
Rachel Mikelson | Co-opted | March 2016 | March 2020 |
Matt Bigam | Co-opted | November 2018 | March 2023 |
Andrew McKenna | Staff | January 2022 | May 2023 |
Jo Lewis | Co-opted | July 2019 | July 2023 |
Miranda Horvath | Co-opted | July 2019 | July 2023 |
William Crammer | Parent | January | January 2024 |
None of these governors had any relevant business or pecuniary interests or other potential conflicts of interest.
Mel Collins (Chair of Governors)
Mel is a co-opted governor, elected in March 2021. Mel became Vice-chair shortly after joining the governing board and has recently become Chair of Governors. Mel has worked in secondary schools for most of her working life, initially as a teacher of geography and humanities in Bristol and Kenya, then in management positions at Comberton Village College and Chesterton Community College, Cambridge. Mel then moved out of schools to lead the education team for the local authority in Peterborough. Mel has lived in Comberton for 40 years and both of her children attended Meridian Primary School.
Catherine Swift (Vice Chair)
Cathy is a co-opted governor who was elected in March 2020 and sits on the FPP committee. She previously worked at a large Primary Federation in Cambridge, where she took on the role of a Key Stage 2 teacher. She later became a non-teaching Deputy Headteacher and managed the curriculum and assessment. Cathy lives in Comberton with her family.
William Cramer (FPP Chair)
William is a parent governor, elected in December 2019, who sits on the Finance, Premises and Personnel committee and is the link governor to the PTA. He runs the engineering and production departments of a medium sized technology business in Melbourn. William has lived with his family in Comberton for 10 years and has a daughter at the school.
Caroline Mulderij (Standards Chair)
Caroline is a co-opted governor who was elected in November 2019 and sits on the Standards committee. She moved to Comberton with her family in 2015. She is a teacher of French at a school in Cambridge and was previously Head of Department and Head of Year at a secondary school in London.
Jasmina Choukair
Jasmina is a parent governor and has two children at Meridian Primary school. She works full time in the NHS as a Senior Project Manager and she joined the Governing Board in November 2021 as she feels that we have a wonderful school and she is really enjoying being involved.
Emma Cox
Emma is a parent Governor who was elected in November 2021 and sits on the FPP Committee. She has lived in Comberton for nearly 20 years and has two children at the school. She is a Business Manager, managing finance and HR for a national organisation specialising in safeguarding. She also has 20 years experience of being a paralegal.
Debbie Jack
Debbie is an associate governor who was elected in February 2018. She has lived in Haslingfield for over 30 years and has three grandchildren at Meridian. Debbie was previously a primary teacher in Bar Hill and since then has been at Middlesex University where she is now Head of Education.
Wayne Laramee
Wayne is a Local Authority Governor and joined in March 2023. Wayne has two children at Meridian. His career has been mostly spent in financial services regulation. He became a governor because he is passionate about education and wanted, working with the school's leadership team and fellow governors, to contribute to the school.
Jenny Weston
Jenny is a staff governor, and currently the Year 4 teacher at Meridian. Before training to be a teacher she worked in Early Years, both as a practitioner and later on as a manager. She is now coming to the end of her first year as an Early Career Teacher and her third year teaching her own class. As she continues through her career as a teacher, she is keen to learn about all aspects of school life, and feels that becoming a teacher governor will give her a new perspective on the way that schools operate. She is looking forward to working with the other governors and teachers to help make sure that our school is achieving high standards.
Kate Edwards
Kate is an associate member and has children in the school.
Vicki Smith
Vicki Smith is a parent governor and has children in the school
Sarah Yates
Sarah is a parent governor and was elected in July 2023 to start 01/09/2023. Sarah is a Chartered Accountant and works as an Executive Level Head of Finance at a London Venue. Sarah attended Meridian Primary School as a child and has fond memories and would like to be able to make a positive contribution to the school as a parent governor.
Ioan Milosevic
Ioan is a co-opted governor and was elected in December 2023 to start 06/12/2023. Ioan is a Doctor, specialising in anaesthetics, and was formally a secondary Maths teacher. He is very enthusiastic about the prospect of contributing to the continued success of Meridian Primary School.
Iris Considine (Clerk)
Iris has been Clerk to the governors and PA to the Headteacher since March 2023. She has worked in education for many years, Finance, HR, and Office Management in both Secondary and Primary.