School Council actively promotes British Values as it gives all pupils a democratic voice. Through School Council, everyone has the opportunity to be involved in making changes that benefit all children at Langdale.

School Council also helps the wider community through fundraising, charity and local environmental projects.

School Council reps from Y2-Y6 meet regularly to discuss and plan projects then give feedback to all classes, with older reps visiting Reception and Y1 to ensure that their voice is also heard. Children talk to the reps about ideas at other times, which is then reported back in meetings.

2022/23 was a busy year:

· School Council supported and visited the Alice Charity in Newcastle.

· Reps worked with Stella from the school catering company to bring about some changes to school meals, based on pupil voice.

· Reps wrote letters to local garden centres, outlining their plans to have a lovely display of spring flowers to improve the school environment, and received £30 worth of vouchers from Garners. This was used to buy bulbs, which were planted by Y4 as a forest school project in autumn.

· School Council arranged two fundraising events for the Dougie Mac. Reps asked for donations of pre-loved books then organised a huge book sale which raised over £300, and the ‘Bring £1 for wearing your Christmas Jumper’ day raised over £130. Sam from the Dougie Mac visited our school to receive the money in a special assembly and thanked both School Council, and the Langdale community, personally.

· School Council ordered 116 fruit tree saplings from the Wildlife Trust’s ‘Free Trees for School’ scheme, with the aim of improving the local environment and supporting wildlife and habitats around our school. The Y5 and Y6 reps planted them one morning in November, assisted by children from every year group from Little Learners to Y6.

 

For 2024, School Council already has a number of upcoming projects based on their recent pupil voice research — so watch this space!

These are some thoughts from present and past reps regarding their role and the purpose of School Council at Langdale:

We give everyone the chance to speak up to make a change and have a choice.

We make sure that we have fairness and everyone is included.

We make sure that everyone has a chance to vote because that’s democracy!

We have great ideas to improve things for everyone in Langdale.

We try to make people smile with the events that we do.

We raise money for charities.

We help improve the school environment.

We have kind hearts.