Greg and I weren’t expecting that we could see a better school council meeting than those we’d already seen in the Czech Republic, but the last school we visited on our tour was the most impressive of the lot.
The ‘Storks’ of Dolní Žandov School have a fantastic structure and flow to their meetings that seemed to engage everyone whilst being really focused on action – they named themselves the Storks after the family of storks that roosts on a chimney over-looking the school. So what made their meeting so special? Well, what was clear was that they had a really good structure that everyone understood which I’ll try to summarise for you.
Before the meeting:
The school council realise that getting certain things in place before the meeting will help the meeting to be a success. They ensure that the school council noticeboard/bulletin is up to date with the most recent school council activities, and that everyone can see the latest information easily.
They also make sure that the minutes and photos from the previous meeting are up on the school council website, as well as the agenda for the coming meeting.
During the meeting:
Here’s a picture of the meeting structure that the school council use each time. Translations below!
1. Welcome
The chair (who rotates from meeting to meeting) starts by welcoming everyone to the meeting, and running through any apologies that have been made.
2. A game
The meeting started with a game to get everyone up, moving and having fun together. Once this had run its course, they reflected on what had worked in the game, what had made it hard and how this related to their school council meetings. Importantly, the game achieved all of this in a few minutes and the group were able to move onto the rest of the meetin
The game was called ‘Finding Nemo’. Basically everyone had to wonder around with their eyes closed calling ‘Nemo’ until they bumped into someone who wasn’t calling out. They then had to stop and be quiet – they have found Nemo. Eventually everyone is still and quiet.
3. Tasks from last time
After welcoming everyone to the meeting the Chair went through the tasks that should have been completed. He referred back to the previous minutes and checked that each person had done what they were supposed to. If they hadn’t completed the task (some hadn’t), they were asked why.
4. Class issues
Next, the reps from each class were asked what issues their class had asked them to raise. They started with the youngest students and moved up through the school. What was particularly good about the way they did this was how the Chair questioned the other students. One of the youngest class reps raised the issue of having a greater variety of school dinners.
The Chair initially responded that there were various pressures that the school was under regarding nutritional standards and so on. He then seemed to check himself and rather than kicking the idea into the long grass as he had seemed inclined to do he asked the young rep, “how do you think we could change this?” They came up with a plan to meet the cook and discuss it with her. It continued like this until there was a list of tasks to complete.
5. Splitting up tasks
The group then looked at the long list of tasks that had been created, and made sure that each one had a person to be in charge of it. It took a while to make sure that everything had a name next to it, but it is seen as a really important way to make sure that things get done.
6. Repeating the most important tasks
To ensure that everyone remembers what the most crucial tasks are, the chair runs through the most important of them to help everyone understand. This happens really quickly, but is seen as important to show everyone that their little task fits into a bigger project or idea.
7. Next meeting
The school council have a rotating chair, since they feel it is important for different people to get a chance to facilitate the meeting. It helps students to chair, when they have seen their peers do it. It means that the teachers don’t have to lead the meeting, or commit themselves to do every task either – this is truly student voice and student action!
8. Reflection
A really important part of the meeting, that has really helped this school council to get better and better. Each time they spend five minutes asking for comments on what went well, and what could be improved about the meeting. It’s really an open forum for the students and teachers to reflect on how the structure has gone.
Only one issue came up in this meeting; that the game at the start hadn’t gone perfectly well because there were two Nemos – a student hadn’t understood fully and stopped staying ‘Nemo’ and confused the game.
Another thing that they did well:
Everyone had a clear role. Most school councils that are working well, and organise efficient meetings have really clear roles. This school council was no exception, and they had a variety of roles alongside the traditional positions of chair, vice-chair and secretary. You can see these below:
Role descriptions in a school council in Dobronin, Czech Republic
From the top, these role descriptions translate as – photographer, getting people in pairs, in charge of noticeboard, meeting minutes, IT support, cameraman, T-shirt organiser, spokesperson, information officer, vice-chairperson and chairperson!
So thanks to the school for inviting us. Without doubt, one of the best school councils we’ve ever seen!
Here’s the final case study in our series of school council case studies. A great example of how school councils can drive school improvement from Barming Primary in Kent.
Key benefits:
Better relationships between students, teachers and governors. There is a strong feeling that they are all working together and the school council helps the school to achieve this.
Every student wants to have a say in how the school runs and school councillors have a high profile.
Students are better prepared to understand and overcome difficult issues. They learn that that helping to improve the school is not always easy and quick, and that it is not just about moaning. For example, the school council are concerned about the relationship between students and the dinner ladies. They have organised a meeting to try to improve things.
Top advice:
Link the students with the governors. Put a standing item on the governing body’s agenda to look at the school council’s minutes and to hear from the children.
To strengthen this link, ask a member of the governing body to be responsible for going to school council meetings. It helps give everyone a rounded experience of the school by sharing different perspectives.
As headteacher, do not attend school council meetings. Students will be less frank and less willing to say what they feel. The headteacher at Barming Primary School meets after each school council meeting with the chair, secretary and treasurer to understand what was agreed and discussed.
Do not shy away from difficult issues, but use them as learning points for all.
Give the school council a budget. Even if it is small, it shows a commitment to the school council and their ability to make realistic choices.
Methods used:
School council
The school council meets regularly and plays an important role in the life of the school. School councillors have a high profile and feature on a prominent display in the school hall. The school council is very popular and the school councillors talk with pride when they discuss what they’ve been working on.
Recent projects include getting more signs in the school to help students know where they are going, mirrors in the school toilets and the relationship between students and the dinner ladies. The school also ran a very successful ‘Apple Day’ which celebrated local varieties of apples and invited the community into the school. The school council is leading on other fruit-themed days using local produce.
The school council has a budget of £50 a year, but the school has decided to raise this to £100.
Strong system of class councils
Class councils regularly talk about ideas and issues that they have in the school. For the school council meetings, they have to come up with their two most important ideas that they would like to be discussed. Two students from each class attend the school council meeting and describe their two ideas.
Regular circle time
Regular circle time helps to boost students’ confidence and ability to talk in front of a group. This strengthens the class councils and school council meetings.
Governor interaction
A governor attends the school council meetings, and there is a standing item on the agenda for all governors meetings to get an update on the school council, and to look at their minutes.
About the school:
Barming Primary School is larger than average. Several significant changes in staff have taken place in the past 18 months, including the headteacher. The school has more boys than girls. Most pupils are White British. The proportion of other minority ethnic heritages is below the national average and includes pupils from a variety of Asian or Black British or Black African heritages. A significant minority of these pupils speak more than one language but few are at the early stages of learning English as an additional language.
The proportion of pupils with special educational needs and/or learning disabilities is broadly average, as is the proportion with a statement of special educational needs. The proportion of pupils known to be eligible for free school meals is below average. In the Early Years Foundation Stage, there are two Reception classes. The school has several awards reflecting its commitment to healthy lifestyles.
Involver conducted these case studies for the Office of the Children’s Commissioner in 2011, as part of a project to encourage schools to involve their students in decision making
Here’s a student voice case study from Woodhouse College, a sixth-form college in Barnet.
It’s a slightly different setting from the other examples we’ve looked at. However, the underlying principles remain the same; student voice can influence the core work of the college, it’s flexible, and involves everyone. Importantly, practice is not imposed on staff, but they’re shown the benefits over time.
“We don’t want college to just be a set of A-levels, we want [students] to grow as people.”
Deputy principal
Key benefits
Student voice has been a powerful driver for improving the quality of the college. “Modernising the relationships” between staff and students has helped learning and teaching to improve.
It broadens and deepens the range of experience that students gain from being at the college. They do not leave with just academic qualifications but with skills of interaction, enquiry and representation.
Students have been able to have an impact on all aspects of the college, from the buildings to rules and learning and teaching.
Top advice:
Do not impose practice on staff. See where there is good practice and share this through staff meetings and INSET.
Get every department to plan targets for developing student voice within their subject area.
Create structures that enable students to form and run their own groups based on interest (eg faith groups, sporting and gaming groups, lesbian and gay groups).
Methods used:
Form reps and college council
Each form group elects a representative who becomes their contact to feed back on whole college issues or raise points for improving the college. Form representatives run weekly meetings with their classes which can be just an open forum or may revolve around specific questions that the whole college is discussing. The form representatives meet regularly together with the student support manager and/or deputy principal to collate responses and decide on action plans.
There is also a whole college election for the college council; this means that friendship groups that might be split across form groups – and so be unable to elect one of their number as a representative in any one form – can elect someone who they feel represents them. The college council has its own budget and runs many of the whole college activities. It also works closely with the student support manager and deputy principal and the form reps.
The split between the roles of the form representatives and the college council is not always completely clear, but the form reps are primarily tasked with representing and collecting the views of the whole college and the college council is about creating new opportunities for people to be involved in the life of the college. They are currently working to better define their areas of responsibility and the relationship between them.
Subject focus groups
Certain subject area are very keen to find out how they are serving the learning needs of its students so there are regular surveys and focus groups to draw out this feedback. As this is not uniform across the college those departments that have been getting the most out of it have been encouraged by management to share their experiences in staff meetings and training. By demonstrating the benefits and tried and tested methods of engaging the students’ voices other departments are encouraged to follow suit.
Student-led interest groups
Students in the college are encouraged and supported to set up their own interest groups, clubs and societies. One of the roles of the student support manager is to be positive towards and enable students to create opportunities like this for others. In this way the student experience is deepened for all. Those students who want to set things up develop skills and a sense of agency and those who just want to be part of these groups have far more to choose from.
In this way the college is directly responding to the needs of students. For example, some students wanted a lesbian and gay group, so they were supported to set one up. This is then something they run in the way they feel comfortable with, rather than something which needs to conform to staff expectations of how such a group might run or look.
Volunteering through Envision
Further opportunities for student action and engagement are provided through volunteering projects with the support of the charity Envision. These do not get students to simply help out on someone else’s project, but be entrepreneurial in their own right.
About the college:
Woodhouse College is a sixth form college operating from a single site on the eastern side of the London Borough of Barnet. The college caters for just over 1000 learners. Nearly all 16 to 18 enrolments were on GCE AS/A level courses. A significant proportion of learners travel from other boroughs, particularly Haringey and Enfield.
The catchment area is economically mixed and diverse in terms of social and ethnic backgrounds. In 2005, about half of the learners were from minority ethnic groups, and 56% were female. At age 16, educational achievement is above average in Barnet, but well below average in Haringey and Enfield.
Involver conducted these case studies for the Office of the Children’s Commissioner in 2011, as part of a project to encourage schools to involve their students in decision making
Wildern School in Southampton approaches student voice through UNICEF’s Rights Respecting Schools model. It’s a great example of how this approach can achieve whole-school improvements. You can read more student voice case studies here.
Key benefits:
A school that is well-suited to the needs of students and the way they want to learn. Students realise that they can (and have) changed major policies and decisions in the school. This helps them to feel engaged in the school.
Better behaviour. The “rights, respect and responsibility” ethos (drawn from the UNICEF’s Rights Respecting Schools Award) gives teachers and students consistent language and expectations across the school. It helps students to understand what right and wrong is.
A proactive and positive student body that improves the school in many ways. Students feel confident to suggest ideas because they are encouraged, supported and trusted to do so.
“It’s good knowing that you can come to school and know that you’re not going to be talked at all day.”
Student council member, Year 9
Top advice
Link everything to the school’s core values, in this case ‘rights, respect and responsibilities’. Links should be made at every relevant opportunity– from schemes of work in the curriculum, to school improvement groups, assemblies, theme days and parental engagement.
Remind people about these values, and how they relate to student-led change. Put posters up around the school and in classrooms, get on the school TVs, and remind staff and students in person.
Trust students. It is their school, and teachers are there to help them learn in an exciting and challenging way.
Set up systems so that students do not have to wait ages to get permission from teachers to move forward. The school has a senior leadership team (SLT) e-proposal form that any student can fill in to email to the SLT. Students have to fully consider an idea or suggestion and can get a quick permission to continue.
Get the right staff member to support it:
“Good student voice doesn’t cost anything. Put the right member of staff to facilitate it, give them time to do it, and start listening to all.”
Deputy headteacher
Start small and take the ‘sowing seeds’ approach. Do not expect to transform participation in school overnight, but start with a small-scale and focused project that you can demonstrate clear results from.
Help reluctant members of staff to see the importance in student voice by asking students to show them the value of student-led projects. They will start to see that students’ ideas are realistic and considered, and that it is not a ‘top-down’ trend from SLT.
Methods used:
Rights Respecting Schools Award
In 2007, students worked on a diversity project with a local school. As part of this, they became aware of UNICEF’s Rights Respecting Schools Award and the three R’s (rights, respect and responsibilities). Students were keen to bring this ethos to Wildern, and successfully encouraged the school to begin a specific project with new Year 7s.
A few years later, this ethos has really taken hold in the school. As the headteacher puts it, the three Rs are “the philosophy of the school” and the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child forms “the foundation” of everything they do.
The school have since received their Level 2 Rights Respecting Schools Award and are an excellent example of what can be done with Rights Respecting Schools.
Range of ways for students to get their voice heard
There a wide range of ways for students to have a say in their learning and their school. These are all linked to, and supported by, Article 12 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. These different projects include the school council, Voting Voice, school focus groups, student evaluators, department student voice meetings, virtual learning environment (VLE) forums, and class discussions.
Voting Voice
All students can have a direct impact on school issues through the Voting Voice system. An issue is picked that all tutor groups discuss at the same time. Views and votes are collected and collated from across the whole school.
This is a great way to encourage whole-school involvement in big projects, but also small issues in the school too.
School improvement groups
One of the successful ways that students get involved in school improvement is through a range of school improvement groups (SIGs).
These student-led groups that work on particular areas in the school. They include groups like Wildern TV, Community Cohesion, Creative Partnership, Learning to Learn and Developing PLTS (personal learning and thinking skills) in the classroom.
About the school:
Wildern School is a very large and heavily oversubscribed 11–16 comprehensive school serving the Hedge End, West End and Eastleigh areas of Southampton. As a community school it is open seven days a week providing a range of facilities and activities for local adults and young people. The school has been awarded specialist status in Performing Arts and is designated as a High Performing Specialist School Raising Achievement and Transforming Learning. It is also a Leading Edge school.
Involver conducted these case studies for the Office of the Children’s Commissioner in 2011, as part of a project to encourage schools to involve their students in decision making
Community-minded and socially aware students who want to take an active role in the school and local area.
Highly politically-literate students who are driven and keen to manage their own projects.
Improved relationships between students, staff and students, and the community in general.
Improved results in the school; students with five A* to C GCSEs has increased by 31 per cent in the last four years.
An ethos built around social justice and the principles of the Co-operative that helps everyone to get along and resolve arguments.
“It’s about changing the world.”
Co-operative Champion, Year 10
Top advice
Provide a wide range of ways for students to get involved in school life – only having a school council is not enough. If you can do this, a wide range of pupils will become involved.
‘Hooks’ to get students involved do not just have to centre around content areas (for example the environment or economics), but students with a particular skill (like photography or design) should be encouraged to participate too.
Schools should approach everyone to get involved, do not discriminate. Although you cannot force students to get involved, you can remind them and keep approaching them – you never know when they would like to do something.
Use something like the Co-operative’s values to involve everyone in a simple and accessible ethos. Student voice and participation becomes far easier when important values are embedded and understood across the school and between students, teachers and governors.
Get students involved at the heart of the community, not in isolation of it. The resources and challenges of the local community present real – not simulated – educational opportunities for student voice and action, but also help young people with certain qualifications.
Methods used:
Co-operative Champions
The school originally trained seven students as Co-operative Champions, who have now successfully trained more than 60 students across the school. The Co-operative ethos has helped to inspire students who do not usually get involved to do so.
Co-operative Champions have a jumper with a special logo on so they are recognisable around the school. They get involved in a wide range of events and projects and see their role as “making the world a better place”. They are also working on several partnerships with other schools across the world, like Reddish Vale’s sister school in Kiafeng, China.
ROC Cafe
ROC Cafe takes place every Friday night after school and gives students a safe space to relax, meet new people, and finish the week off on a positive note. ROC stands for “Redeeming Our Communities”, and the cafe opened in April 2010. Over 70 students attend most weeks, and students have had a strong role in planning and running the cafe. As one school council member put it:
“ROC Cafe has been a great success. Students have a good time and leave their troubles at the door.”
School council member, Year 9
School council
The school also has a traditional school council model, with year councils. This has an important role in school improvement and influence school decisions. This model tends to attract students who are more interested in parliamentary-style school improvement.
Ethiopian Coffee Collective
An example of one of many student-led co-operative projects: The school buys coffee directly from a coffee producer in Ethiopia, and sells it in the school. Students are learning important marketing and co-operation skills from this project, and are working hard to see it go from strength to strength.
Community engagement
The school works closely with, and for, the community in Reddish. This improves education opportunities for students, as well as the community itself. The school is also an important resource forthe community – Reddish is an area of high socio-economic deprivation, and young people are involved with around 100 of the local areas 150 small businesses.
About the school
Reddish Vale Technology College is a larger than average mixed comprehensive school serving an area of relative disadvantage. The college has had specialist technology status since 1995 and has been a full service extended school since 2005. The majority of the college population are of White British heritage and few students are at the early stages of learning English.
The percentage of pupils eligible for free school meals is higher than the national average, as is the percentage of those with learning difficulties and/or disabilities. The population of the college is stable, with relatively few students joining or leaving the college after entering in Year 7. Attendance is in line with the national average and better than many similar schools.
Involver conducted these case studies for the Office of the Children’s Commissioner in 2011, as part of a project to encourage schools to involve their students in decision making
Here’s a student voice case study from Matthew Moss High School, including some really powerful quotations from teachers and pupils. Without doubt, one of our favourite schools!
Key benefits of student voice:
The school is achieving its aims (and what it sees as the aim of schooling), which is to create:
Students who are engaged with learning, they expect to learn and challenge staff to enable it. They leave the school with skills to continue learning. This greater ability for independent learning is recognised by local colleges and evidenced by the fact that fewer Matthew Moss High School (MMHS) students end up not in employment, education or training (NEET) after leaving the school.
Positive relationships between staff and students, resulting in few raised voices; behaviour issues are dealt with constructively.
The pride students feel in their school is based on how well everyone is included and treated, irrespective of race, religion, behavioural issues or physical disability.
“[Other schools will] only have Christians. This school is a lot more open. Everyone accepts everyone else. That’s what makes a good school.”
Year 10 student
“You have to be part of Matthew Moss to understand how great it actually is, how open-minded it is to students who might have a bit of behaviour problems.”
Year 9 student
Top advice:
Examine and be clear about the purpose of school. Be willing to break down, throw out or reconstruct practices, structures and pedagogy that do not help you achieve this purpose. Do not just keep on doing the same things because “that’s the way schools work”, learn from other industries, educators and academics
“It’s about learning, because if these learners can get really powerful as learners, they will get on anywhere. There’s two parts to that: first of all people need skilling up, but they also needs practice in terms of expressing their agency. Even now the best practice in the UK, pedagogically, is to give kids a load of skills, but not let them employ them in schools. So they’re not used to it, they’re still used to being compliant, obedient, willing workers. It’s no good for them, no good for the national and international community; we want people with agency, so let kids drive. Why not? Otherwise how are they going to learn to drive?
Yeah they start off doing some project stuff and they start off getting skilled up and then increasingly it becomes enquiry-based: What do you want to learn? How are you going to structure it? And the teacher is no longer portal of all things but actually facilitator, scrutineer, mentor, coach and goes into that function. And for me that is such an important step in student voice. We’ve got a school council, [students] choosing uniform, student lesson observers, students in the interview process; we’ve got all that and it’s really important, but what’s central? What do we do for most of the time in school? It’s teaching and learning: for 30 periods a week you’re in a classroom. Now how about giving learners control of that? Because that is vital, that’s everything.”
Deputy headteacher and Learning Futures Co-ordinator
Do not separate student voice from the curriculum. Students are in classes 30 periods a week, if they cannot co-construct what is going on there then they cannot really learn to be self-managing, responsible and collaborative.
Do not expect a ‘quick fix’; this is about fundamental change to the way most schools run. This kind of change is a slow process that starts with staff, moves to students and eventually involves parents and the rest of the community.
“Take fear out of the system, forget performance management, forget league tables. 97 per cent of people want to do a brilliant job, let them. Don’t build systems for the three per cent and make the 97 per cent follow them. You get no risk, no creativity, no nothing.”
Deputy headteacher
Methods used:
Co-construction of learning
At Matthew Moss the most important aspect of student voice is for students to influence what and how they are learning. This directly engages every student in the core business of the school and their main reason for being there. The school has arrived at this method through a slow process of reflection on the purpose of the school and a re-evaluation of how to achieve that purpose. They have been heavily influenced by the ideas of management experts such as W. Edwards Deming as well as creative educators like Larry Rosenstock.
“There are 26 people in the classroom, one of whom is a teacher, harness the intellectual power of all of them to design the learning.”
Deputy headteacher
My World
In My World students use project-based learning to design their own inquiry in to a subject of their own choosing. They are given an overall heading (a current one is ‘money from nothing’ which encourages students to be enterprising with rubbish) but then under that they can choose to do almost anything. They can work with whoever they like in whatever medium. During the course of the project learners have a university-style viva where they are interviewed by teachers, governors or other learners about they have been doing and have learned. Constructive feedback is given and areas for further inquiry and ways to progress are agreed. At the end of the project (which lasts about a term) all students need to exhibit their learning and participate in another viva.
Eight periods from thirty in the week are dedicated to My World in Year 8.
“My World helps other subjects. Before My World teachers would just get you to copy off the board, but My World has helped in other subjects, it’s helped more variety in other subjects. There’s a lot of different types of learning in the classroom: there’s more hands on stuff, making things, or working on the computer, or writing, or doing presentations.”
Year 9 student
Curriculum subjects
Students have been co-constructing learning in a different way in some curriculum subjects. For example, a Year 11 science class took the first week of an eight week course to plan what would happen in the other seven. The teacher shared with them the intended learning outcomes for the course and together they decided how they would achieve them:
“They even designed their own assessment, because if the assessment is too slack, it doesn’t favour them when they get to the exam. The co-construction is so powerful: the learning-design is much better.”
Deputy headteacher
Project-based learning that allows students a say in who they work with, what they study and how they present their learning is becoming more and more common throughout the curriculum at Matthew Moss, from Key Stage 3 and in to BTEC and GCSE classes. This allows students to develop skills of self-management and inquiry as well as get deep into areas of knowledge. As well as their investigations into their own subject, students are excited by what other students are doing. In addition to people looking over one another’s shoulders, there is always a time where students formally share their learning with one another, for example through presentations or a marketplace.
“It’s better than just getting set work because you can actually do something you’re interested … I’ve have actually learnt more because I want to do it, not I have to do it.”
Year 10 BTEC Science student who was learning about bridges with a partner in a classroom where others were studying whales, the eye, rockets, the life cycle of frogs and more.
Culture of responsibility
In everything the school does people are expected to take responsibility for themselves. So students are responsible for their own learning, rather than teachers being responsible for it. Teachers not managers are responsible for creating spaces and experiences that enable students to learn. Students are responsible for their own behaviour, so instances of unacceptable behaviour result in a discussion between staff and student on why they acted as they did. Excuses are not tolerated, explanations are required. For these conversations to be entered in to students and staff all must have a voice, must have an expectation that they will be listened to and that their view will be respected.
If everyone is responsible for their own learning a simple top-down hierarchy cannot work. Everyone needs to have the opportunity to voice the view that the system is not allowing them to learn as well or as much as they would like. Voice and agency are intrinsic parts of responsibility.
Family councils
The school’s pastoral system is structured through four Families. Each Family consists of a quarter of the vertical tutor groups. Each of the Families has a council voted on through all the tutor groups during a whole-school election day. Meetings happen in each tutor group on a regular basis and the information and views from these is fed up to the Family council and back down again.
Family councils can work on whole-school issues, so one is currently looking at how PSHE is working and another is looking at the uniform. These issues are decided upon by the students. The fact that Families and tutor groups cut across all ages in the school mean that they can be more representative of whole-school feelings than a year council would be.
The intention is to move towards the Family councils as commissioners of learning as well as dealing with pastoral and environmental issues.
There is an acceptance in the school that the school council has not really been working as well as it might, but that it is an important thing to have. However, rather than looking to simply relaunch it with a new name or voting structure the school has taken a different approach: they are strengthening the tutor group meetings and the Family councils.
They understand that getting these working well is more important and simpler, as they can deal with more local, immediate issues. As these grow in confidence they know that students will see the need for a school council that co-ordinates the work of all the Family councils and will have the skills to manage it. This will allow it to grow from the bottom up, rather than be imposed from the top down.
About the school:
Matthew Moss High School is an average sized secondary school situated in Rochdale, Greater Manchester. The percentage of students with special educational needs and/or disabilities is above the national average as is the proportion of those with a statement of special educational needs. The proportion of students known to be eligible for free school meals is above average and increasing. Some 41 per cent of students are of minority ethnic background. The school has specialist science college status.
Involver conducted these case studies for the Office of the Children’s Commissioner in 2011, as part of a project to encourage schools to involve their students in decision making
