Tag: school councils uk

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Citizenship SchoolCouncilsUK-archive

The reaction to the YCC's report will demonstrate the real political will to engage young people

The most telling question/statement at the launch of the Youth Citizenship Commission‘s final report came from a delegate representing the National Foundation for Educational Research (NFER), he suggested something along the lines of, “Wouldn’t it be ironic if the Government’s response to this report is to do nothing? What would that tell young people about the limits of their influence and citizenship?” All Government commissions run the risk of being ignored by Government, but the questioner was right, it would be particularly pointed if the recommendations of this report were not taken up. The findings of the Commission were that (like other groups in society) there is a disillusion with politics because young people do not feel they are listened to. Arguably what is worse than not being listened to at all, is being told you’ve got the chance to have your say and have an influence and then to have that views dismissed anyway. (I see this all the time in schools with school councils where there are boundaries to what they can do, but these are never discussed or communicated with the pupils, they are just told ‘No’ when that issue arises).

So, whilst I think the Commission has done a great job and made many important recomendations (not least about the need for standards for school and class councils), ultimately whether this has any real benefit will come down to the Government’s actions: inaction will be failure.

Asher

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Citizenship SchoolCouncilsUK-archive

School Councils UK is mentioned in the Youth Citizenship Commission

Asher and I  went to the launch of the Youth Citizenship Commission’s Report in Westminster today. It was great to hear people talk about the value of school councils alongside class councils.  The commissioners really understood the value of pupil voice and effective  school councils, it was clearly expressed that pupil voice has to be respected and the young people involved need to be given real power in the school decision-making processes, otherwise the work can be disillusioning do more damage than good.

There was also a big mention for the School Council Standard, which is a project we are working on getting funding for at the moment – so a good morning for School Councils.  It’ll be interesting to see what the Government does the Comission’s findings.

Vicky

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SchoolCouncilsUK-archive

The anti-school council

I recently went to a pupil voice conference, with a variety of workshops run by school council members in the area. I was surprised by one school, who presented their version of pupil voice that wasn’t a school council. The workshop started with a dramatic statement by the head of the primary school stating that their school didn’t have a council because they wanted “to involve all the school.”  I was intrigued… Has she not heard of class councils, or year councils?!  The students then went to on to explain (in a speech most definitely written by the headmistress)  how they approach student voice, wait for it, this is very innovative…… The headmistress and deputy head go to each class once a week and ask if they have any problems and there is also a suggestion box which if you submit your problem, you get a cosy one-to-one with the head to discuss the issue.

It really does seem to hark back to the school dark ages, and shows us that pupil voice still is very neglected in many schools. This school’s attitude really seemed to be: who needs pupil voice when the headmistress can run the whole shebang and not have those pesky pupils putting their ideas across and and getting in the teachers’ way of organising the school.

Vicky

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SchoolCouncilsUK-archive

‘YOUth citizenship: inside and out’

Yesterday, Learning and Teaching Scotland’s Young People’s Advisory Group announced it’s first national conference ‘YOUth citizenship: inside and out‘.

The event has already sparked off much interest from all over Scotland. The idea of the day is to explore citizenship in order to make more people understand its importance and to celebrate acheivements that have been made theough citizenship.

If you would like to find out more about this event of the work of the Young People’s Advisory Group please visit their website.

Daisy

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SchoolCouncilsUK-archive

Benefits of being on a school council

The Independent Schools Council this week reported that their research has shown that extra-curricular activities improve academic performance.

Whilst school councils are not necessarily an extra-curricular activity the research from isc examined how “many studies have shown that a rounded education comes from a combination of good academic grounding coupled with wider experiences outside of the classroom.” We believe that school councils provide many worthwhile experiences both in and outside the classroom which help towards a rounded education.

Furthermore, it was shown that academic success was not the only benefit of being involved with the wider school community. Pupils that are involved in more activities, such as school councils, are likely to have more friends and receive greater recognition from their peers. In addition it was shown that these students also coped better with both social and psychological adjustments.

Daisy

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SchoolCouncilsUK-archive

Can school councils represent everyone in a large school?

I am currently reading a paper that has been published by the Human Scales School Project, which is a partnership between Human Scale Education and the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation. The idea behind Human Scale Education is to create small scale learning communities where children and young people are known and valued as individuals.

The report looked into how Stantonbury Campus, a school with 2,600 pupils, and how it manages to achieve human scale thinking in such a large school. Stantonbury Campus has divided their school into five ‘halls’ each containing around 500 pupils. The purpose of these halls is to act as mini-schools with their own individual head teacher and teaching staff.

The report is interesting in that one of the final recommendations for good practice is “Student voice involving students in the learning arrangements and organization of the school.” The way in which Stantonbury achieves this is for each hall to have their own elected school council who have control of a budget and are involved in all aspects of their hall.

We recognize that sometimes in a large school the school council does not represent all pupils, do you think by having separate school councils for different pupils will mean that the whole school is represented? Or do you think that this will mean the school will become segregated? Is there a better way of involving the whole school community in the decisions made by the school council?

Daisy