Pupil Voice

Pupil Voice At Bourne Abbey

Pupil Voice is an incredibly important part of the ethos of our school, as enshrined by Article 12 of the UNCRC:

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Pupil Voice Matters!

Why involve children and young people?

Some of the benefits of involving children and young people in decision making are:

It encourages pupils to become active participants in a democratic society – by holding youth parliaments and school councils which develop skills such as co- operation and communication and encourage them to take responsibility.

Increased confidence, self- respect, competence and an improved sense of responsibility have all been reported by young people who contribute in school. Schools also report increased motivation and engagement with learning.

A few of the things that show the value of pupil voice in our school are listed below:

Student Council

At the beginning of the year, each class voted for their school councillor. The elected school councillors meet weekly with Mrs Anderson to plan events to improve school.

Student Council is a group of children from Bourne Abbey from Year 1 to Year 6 who meet regularly to discuss our school and ways to make it a happier and better place to learn. You can find our minutes from the latest Student Council meetings at the bottom of this page – we update this regularly, to show how important it is to us!

Collective Worship Council

As a Collective Worship Councillor the children may be required to assist in planning assemblies, taking part in church services, teaching other children in their class about Christian topics, creating drama sketches on Bible stories, demonstrating values and writing prayers. They will also be required to attend meetings with other Collective Worship Councillors to discuss Collective Worship and how they can make them even more exciting.

All of our councillors have very important jobs that are specifically linked to our Collective Worship

Some of their jobs include;

keeping the reflection area tidy;
writing prayers for Collective Worship;
demonstrating how to use our school values;
meeting to plan assemblies, discuss how their jobs are going, write prayers and lots more;
feeding back the minutes of our meetings;
looking for children who are using their Bourne Abbey School Values;
helping staff in Collective Worship with a range of activities and tasks.

UNICEF Ambassadors

The group meet regularly to discuss ways to embed the ethos of Rights Respecting Schools and be recognised as a Rights Respecting School. The Rights Respecting Schools charter is based on the U.N. Convention of the Rights of a child which encourages schools to place the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child at the heart of its ethos and curriculum.

Eco Team

Our school Eco-Team makes decisions which help make our school more sustainable and environmentally friendly. Whether it is monitoring energy usage, how we travel to school or even making us think carefully about which lights to turn on they are always reminding us how important these decisions are.

E-Safety Champions

Pupils take an active role in their own and their peers’ learning of online safety. E-Safety Champions ‘team teach’ with the class teacher to help children learn about e-safety. They also take part and lead Collective Worships throughout the year and are heavily involved with Safer Internet Day and the school council.

There is one e-safety champion per class and they help to remind children that they can report any problems to an adult or on the website/game they are on.

Although we believe that empowering children with the underpinning knowledge and behaviours as a way to keep safe in the modern world, we know that children are the first people to discover apps, new games and problems. By having e-safety champions and regular meetings, staff get to hear about the latest trend/app to potentially be aware of and the pupils have a voice throughout school.

You can find copies of the minutes from our latest Student council meetings below: