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Governing councils membership

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Council membership – your site

The specific membership details for your council can be found in your site’s constitution.

The information below helps if you want to:

  • change the membership of your council
  • check that people are fairly represented.

If you want to know who is allowed to be on a council, take a look at eligibility for governing councils.

Example memberships

Just as every site’s setting is different, every site’s council membership can be different too. You can look at some site-specific scenarios in memberships of specific types of schools in the different constitutions:

Governing councils – a general membership overview

All governing councils must:

  • have a minimum of 5 members
  • be made up mostly of parent members, unless the site has mostly adult students
  • have a site leader as an ex officio member
  • have 2 student members at schools with secondary enrolments.
Governing councils – a general membership overview
WhoOptional/requiredMinimumMaximum
Parents Required, unless site has mostly adult students 5, unless site has mostly adult students None
Site leader (principal/director) Required 1 1 per site
Community Optional None 3
Staff Optional None 3, but depends on number of students
Students Optional for primary schools.
Required for schools with secondary enrolments.
None 2, unless site has mostly adult students
Affiliated committees Optional None 3

Staff representation on councils

Staff members on council are elected by the staff of the school, according to the following ratios.

Total number of students

(across all campuses or for each school)

Staff members that can be elected to council

60 or fewer

Nil

61 to 300

1

301 to 600

2

601 or more

3

Site Governance, Schools and Preschools

Phone: 8226 9617
EmailEducation.sitegovernance [at] sa.gov.au