Arnside National School- School Council

‘We try to help improve the school and make it a better place’

 

Arnside National School Council, 2024-2025

Our representatives for 2024-2025 are:

 

 

 

Otter Class

Tommy Axon

Alba Parry

Dillon Igo

Ned Waddington

Butterfly Class

Robert Park

Sailor Smith

Swift Class

Elsie Lloyd

Felix Denny

Osprey

Flo Walters

Barney Willis

 

What is school council in our school?

The school council works to make improvements to the school and the way we do things at Arnside School. We look around for things that could be better and discuss what to do. Everyone gets a chance to speak and when we’ve finished we vote on the best ideas and then start working on changing things. Sometimes we have to talk to teachers and sometimes we have to make phone calls to people outside of the school. It’s a brilliant way of representing and contributing to Pupil Voice in our school and feeling part of the whole school community.

 

The election process

Election of the School Council is based solely on pupil votes after each child has shared their manifesto with the school. This process reflects the British electoral system.

In October we did an election process in classes. Children wrote down someone in their class who they thought would be suitable and a good representative to be in the school council. Once the nominations were in, the top three children from each class told their class why they deserved to be voted for. Classes then filled in a ballot paper to decide who would be the school council representative for their class/year group. Once the votes were decided and counted, we announced in a collective worship and badges were given out. The chosen children were officially part of the school council! We have a boy and girl representative for each year group.

What makes a school council successful?

A good school councilor is one that represents the views of all students and gets things done. These are some things that make a school council effective:

  • Regular meetings
  • A council that is not too big
  • Class/Form councils that meet regularly
  • Good communication between representatives and their class
  • Training for school council members
  • Smaller groups (subcommittees) working on specific events or issues
  • A bank account or budget (however small)
  • Annual evaluations

What qualities does a school councilor need?

The children of Arnside School discussed the qualities needed to make a good school councilor. They said-

A school councilor needs to be kind

A school councilor needs to be helpful

A school councilor needs to be loving

A school councilor needs to be willing to help

A school councilor needs to be confident

 

What our school council have done in the last year

  • We have raised money for the Fairtrade Foundation (£62.36) by selling Fairtrade chocolate
  • We did a Christmas fair last year with lots of games and the leftover chocolates from the chocolate stand and this money went to the PTA to support trips/residentials

Class suggestion boxes

  • Each class has their own school council suggestion box.
  • Here are some examples of previous suggestions- Year 6 Play leaders to organise playtime sports clubs for the younger children once a week
  • If you have any good suggestions, please pop them in your class suggestion box and we will discuss the suggestions at our school council meetings

Pupil Parliament

The Year 5 & 6 school councilors are members of the South Lakes Pupil Parliament which meets termly to give children from different schools the opportunity to discuss and address issues in our local area.

When do we meet?

We meet on a Thursday during child led worship on the 2nd Thursday of every month in the library with Mr Sharp.


Glossary

We try to be very professional in the council so we use a lot of business words. Hopefully this will help.

Agenda - a list of things to talk about

Councilor - someone who has been voted for to work for their class mates on the school council

Minutes - the notes taken during a meeting so people can see what goes on

Motion - an idea for the council to discuss

 

What we want to raise money for?

We would like to raise money to purchase some new books for our school library and more sports equipment for playtimes.

Check this page for regular updates about our meetings.