Over the past five years the children of Hartford Infant School have successfully elected two councillors from each class each year.
The children are all allowed to self-nominate and are encouraged to write their own manifestos in the week leading up to the election.
We aim to coincide our elections with the UK Parliament Week in November of each year. All teachers prepare the children through a series of lessons in our PSHE sessions and in assemblies on what voting means to ensure all children are aware of the connotations. We then hold our elections in class and have a discreet voting procedure.
The elected children meet with a nominated member of staff regularly to discuss areas of importance. They also feed back views, ideas and opinions to individual classes and in assemblies. Each school councillor wears a pin badge during the school day. This way everyone knows who they are and who represents the student voice.
In 2019 we started our ‘Big Conversation’ each half term where the children are encouraged in mixed age groups to dicuss pertinent issues. The School Councillors are encouraged to support these meetings by feeding back ideas from their group at the meetings. The 'Big Conversation' discusses important issues linked the School Development Plan which is all about making the school a better place for the children. The children's thoughts are recorded and summarised for everyone to read in the school office.
Each class has two councillors and these will be decided during UK Parliament Week - 1st November 2021.
These are our elected children for 2021-2022:
Class 1 – Zara & Barkley
Class 2 – Seth & Grace
Class 3 – Martha & Arthur
Class 4 – Emily & Connor
Class 5 – Theo & Robyn
Class 6 – Lotta & Genevieve
Click here to see a picture of our School Councilors.
The School Council meet regularly with Mrs du Toit to discuss pertinent issues within the school, click here for the latest agenda.
The School Councillors created a front cover for their meetings agenda book, which they voted for using their knowledge of democracy. Click here to see the front cover.