Appoint an election organiser

Think about appointing an election organiser to promote the board’s triennial and mid-term elections, and even a by-election. This is a different role from the Returning Officer.

The current school board is responsible for making the most of all opportunities to promote school governance. Make sure succession planning strategies are in place to encourage effective new board members to join the board. This means having enough people with a balance of skills, experiences, gender and ethnicity are nominated. Make this something your school community wants to be part of.

The school board election organiser has a key role in ensuring a successful election. They lead their school’s initiatives to encourage informed people to stand and to support the school community to exercise their vote. The school board appoints the organiser. They should liaise regularly with the presiding member (chair) to confirm when each step of the process is occurring, in order to plan for a successful result. The election organiser, the board chair and the returning officer should liaise regularly to confirm when each step of the process is occurring in order to plan for a successful result.

The ideal election organiser should be:

• competent in working with Māori, Pasifika and families of those with special learning needs
• knowledgeable and positive about the achievements of the board
• enthusiastic and committed to the school
• a good communicator and fluent in the language/s of instruction in the school
• effective at organising people and activities
• culturally competent

The job may be shared, but this would mean that the co-ordination of activities must be very clear.

The board may decide to pay the organiser.

This person could be a current board member but is better to be someone who isn’t intending to stand as a candidate in this election.

The role of promoting the elections cannot be a requirement of the returning officer.