The School Council is represented by a group of children who have been elected by their peers to voice their feelings and views about school life.

The meetings are led by the children. The formal meetings are also attended by some governors and staff members. Before a formal meeting is held the Head Boy and Girl, who chair the meeting, will have a purely child-led meeting to discuss ideas and concerns and then create an agenda. This agenda is then presented to two key staff members who advise on the best way to discuss the key points. It is at this stage that a formal meeting is set and each member of the School Council is formally invited to attend.

After the meeting it is the responsibility of each Head of Year to meet with the School Council Year Representatives and with the Form Representatives who will, in turn, feed back information to their respective forms. Although the process can be lengthy we are finding that the system is effective.

The first meeting began with a consolidation of some of the successful outcomes from last year including the regeneration of the student toilets and the creation of T20 for Key Stage 3 children. T20 is a great idea where children will try to achieve twenty life experiences during the academic year. Ways in which to keep this initiative fully active for the whole year were discussed.

Some of the new items discussed were: improved water fountains; creation of a stationery shop; indoor area for children’ use during break and lunchtimes particularly when it rains; more cash machines for topping up lunch cards; litter picking duties used for behaviour sanctions or to raise student awareness of keeping their school tidy.