This morning I read an interesting story about how the school council at a Kent school are publicly disagreeing with a recent Ofsted judgement on their school.
It’s fantastic to see students having pride in their school and defending it in this way and it demonstrates some of the benefits of student voice: it develops a sense of ownership and responsibility for the school and provides a very important perspective on how the school is working.
I’d be very interested to know though whether they would have received the same support in publicising their views if the situation had been reversed. If the school had received a positive report, but the students’ experience is negative, what would have happened?
This article raises a couple of questions:
What weight is put on each of these two views: that of Ofsted and of the students?
Do you use student voice to support and challenge what is going on in your school?
We’re currently evaluating a project called Our Say Our Way and we have two offers for you in return for helping us (and you don’t even have to know what it is to get them):
Enter a draw to win one of three £20 Amazon vouchers
Get a day’s free action workshops for a youth group this summer
1. Entering the draw
To enter the draw all you need to do is spend a few minutes filling out a short survey about youth and community projects. It doesn’t matter if you have loads of experience of them or none, whether or not you’ve been part of Our Say Our Way or how old you are; we’re looking for a real range of views.
Please pass it on to your colleagues and young people you work with.
2. Free action workshops
If you can get a group of at least ten 12 to 21 year-olds together this month, our expert trainers will run workshops for them based on the Our Say Our Way model. These will get them to:
Work as a team
Identify issues in their community
Work out solutions
Plan their actions
Manage a project
All participants will receive a certificate and your youth group will have a plan (or plans) for some positive action in your community.
There is only funding for two sessions, so please email asher@involver.org.uk or call Asher on 07989497491 straight away if you would like to take part.
About Our Say Our Way
Our Say Our Way is an exciting project which encourages young people to have a say on the issues that affect them.
Led by Peabody and sponsored by the Big Lottery Fund, it gives 12-21-year-olds a voice and a chance to have their say about the decisions that impact their lives and their local community. They can then make a positive difference to themselves and others around them.
Although the school council is doing a lot people don’t know about it.
The suggestion
Whenever the school council does anything make a plaque and stick it up in a relevant place – or as relevant a place as you can find. You want to have the school covered in them.
Plaques could just be laminated card, but the better they look the more important the school council will be seen to be.
The outcome
People are always reminded of the ability of the school council to make change; therefore they are more likely to involve the school council when they want to change something.
It becomes obvious where the school council has not managed to have an impact yet.
Additional ideas
You could develop a logo for the school council to put on these plaques and to help identify the school council.
This is just one way of promoting the school council. The most important thing is to have a strong, regular structure of class meetings and feedback so everyone in the school knows how they are involved in making changes in the school.
We’ve spent quite a big chunk of this year working on a youth engagement guide for social housing providers with Peabody, Home Group, CBHA and CDHT.
That’s a fancy way of saying that we’ve been collecting loads of good hints and tips to help young people who live in houses owned by the council or housing associations to get more involved in their community.
We’ve been working closely with the Our Say Our Way partners and visited lots of young tenants and staff on estates across the country. It’s been brilliant to work with young people outside of schools. Especially since it has helped us to learn about participation in a slightly different setting from what we’re used to.
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
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
