We believe that the School Council encourages children to understand and value the ideals of democracy and citizenship.  The School Council represents the views of all children and looks at ways to improve our Academy, alongside providing leadership and development opportunities for the children.  It enables the children to develop problem solving skills, alongside making a positive impact upon the community.

Our school council is made up of 2 representatives from each class in Year 2. Every class votes for two people that they think would make good school councillors. They are looking for people who can listen, are responsible and are good speakers.

The School Council meets at least once every half term. They start by listening to the opinions of the other children in their class on the items from the School Council agenda. They then attend full council meetings to discuss the ideas from their class with  Ms Elliott and Mrs Burden. When they return to their class they then feedback what they have decided and what the new agenda is.

The council discuss various matters, ranging from new playground equipment to friendship issues and new ideas to develop the school.

The school council works hard to solve problems, bring new ideas and to make the school an even better place to be.

How have we been involved with decision making in the past year?

The School Council have contributed in the following ways;

TREE OF LEARNING

• We explored why we think it's important to think about our attitudes towards learning, and were involved in discussing ways to improve MGIAs current approach to encouraging these attributes - Our Tree of Learning (TOL), making it have more impact.  
• We reflected upon which rewards we would like to see attached to the new updated TOL.

FOOD POLICY

• We helped to review and update our Food Policy, putting forward our opinions about the food provided in school (snack and dinner times).
• Whether we thought we had enough opportunities to learn about food and healthy eating within the academy (reflecting upon DT, Science and Jigsaw lessons, alongside Health Week activities).
• We also had the opportunity to put forward suggestions about ways we could enhance or improve our learning about food.

SAFEGUARDING

• We explored what we thought safeguarding was all about and established an understanding of what it was after a discussion with Ms Elliott. It's all to do with keeping everyone safe and protected.  
• We gained an awareness of what the different coloured lanyards worn by the adults around the academy stood for, and how important it is to tell a member of staff if we notice an adult not appearing to wear one.
• We also explored who our Safeguarding Leads are within the Academy, and were made aware that they were who we should turn to if we had a safeguarding question.  We were reminded of the Safeguarding posters displayed around the academy and that they were a reminder of who was in charge of safeguarding.

PSHE POLICY

• We discussed which qualities, skills, attributes and values that we believed to be important to us as people.
• We were consulted as regards to how our Academy could support us with this and what initiatives could be implemented.
• We shared our opinions on our PSHE SOW - Jigsaw.

KITCHEN GARDEN

• We have been consulted about which vegetables we would like to grow in our new wooden troughs within our kitchen garden, and discussed which types would grow successfully in our country's climate.