Blakehill School Council
The purpose of the School Council is to represent the views and opinions of pupils and to be a forum for active and constructive pupil input into the daily life of the school. Each class in year groups 1 – 6 has an elected representative. Class elections take place in September each year.
The School Council benefits the whole school as it gives opportunities for pupils to communicate feelings and opinions to teachers and support staff as well as influencing decisions that are made.
How does the School Council work?
The School Council representatives meet at least once each month during the school year. Meetings are usually on a Tuesday morning and last about half an hour. They are given the opportunity to discuss any issues raised by their peers or by a member of staff and later that day, time to feedback to their class. Occasionally, visitors from outside school will attend meetings to promote an activity or to ask for support or opinions. The meetings are led by the Chair and minutes are taken by the Secretary of the School Council. Mrs Gould also attends meetings.
What is the role of a School Councillor?
Pupils who are elected have been given a very important job to do in the school. Pupils are expected to:
- attend all meetings
- talk to the classes they represent, feedback information and share ideas and opinions with the School Council
- have ideas to share with the Council
- bring their class suggestion box to meetings
- speak with confidence
- speak in assembly
- consider and respect the views of others
- be identifiable by wearing the school council badge
School Council 2023/ 24
After the class elections, we have now got a new school council. Councillor Ian Parsons attended our first meeting to discuss the role of councillors.
This morning the school council met and it was agreed that Manraj would become the chair person for the council. The children discussed roles and responsibilities that they would like children to have in school such as:
litter pickers
prefects
buddies
playtime monitors
eco monitors
lunch time buddies
The council will work with Lumb to get some some of these roles up and running.
litter pickers
prefects
buddies
playtime monitors
eco monitors
lunch time buddies
The council will work with Lumb to get some some of these roles up and running.
After the first week of collecting suggestions from their classes, at todays meeting the children spoke about having more plants in their classrooms.
The children also wanted:
drama classes
drama classes
playground equipment
litter pickers to keep school tidy
The school council met today and had several visitors.
We met Mr Lumb to discuss a range of after school clubs that the children would like to introduce such as drama club, art club and cooking club. Mr Lumb is looking into getting these clubs up and running.
We also met with Miss Gardner to discuss the new rewards for reading at home. The class with the highest home readers each week will receive a £5 voucher to spend on a book of their choice.
Mel - our site manager - also met with us to discuss some improvements that the children would like in the ks2 toilets. Mel is going make these improvements.
The school council also planned the Children In Need day on 17th November.
Our school council visited City Hall to find out about the history and role of the Bradford council. The children developed their understanding of democracy.
Cllr Ian Parsons and Cllr Sabiya Khan joined us on the visit and showed us their seats in the Council Chamber.
School Council 2022/ 23
After the class elections, we have now got a new school council. Both the old and new council members met today to hand over. The new council are going to continue the campaign for a safer road outside school but also want to reintroduce a tuck shop for snacks.
As well as the school council, James is going to chair an new eco council.
Information from the School Council
Parents using Mobile Phones.
The school council discussed parents using mobile phones at the beginning and end of the school day as they pick children up and drop them off at school. The children in council felt that parents should be banned from using mobile until they have spoken to the children about their day.
The school council made posters to display at the school gate.
Wear Orange to School
The school council looked at some local charities and decided that they would like to support the Azaylia Foundation Charity. The Azaylia Foundation was created to fight childhood cancer. They are committed to advancing early diagnosis and new treatment availability in the UK.
The school council asked children to orange to school and make a donation to the charity.
The school council are delighted with the new signs which were paid for by the money raised from Break The Rules Day.
These will be displayed on the school fence to encourage parents and carers to park safely.
Our school council met with Cllr Sunderland and members of Bradford council and to discuss the issue of speeding outside school.
Cllr Sunderland and the council are going to make the speed limit 20mph and have approved funding for speed cushions to be placed at either side of the school.
Our school council are continue their campaign to keep the area around school safe for children at the beginning and end of the day. Our children have asked parents to park their responsibly when dropping children off.
All children will be bringing home a leaflet about parking safely.
We put our new banners up outside school to remind parents not to park on zigzag lines.
Growing Plants
The eco council and school council have worked together today as both council want to see more plants both inside and outdoors in the school grounds. Today the two councils decorated plant pots which were kindly donated by Homebase and next week Homebase staff are going to work with the councils to plant bulbs.
Growing Plants
To continue our work on growing plants, we visited Homebase who donated plant pots and bulbs. We enjoyed working with the staff to plant bulbs and we can't wait to see what they look like when they start to grow.
Winter Coat Appeal
The children in the school council wanted to ensure that all children at Blakehill have a warm coat this winter. The council made an appeal to parents to donate any spare coats.
The children in the school council wanted to ensure that all children at Blakehill have a warm coat this winter. The council made an appeal to parents to donate any spare coats.
Winter Coat Appeal
The school council collected lots of coats and displayed them in the playground each morning for families to take. We hope everyone keeps warm this winter.
The school council collected lots of coats and displayed them in the playground each morning for families to take. We hope everyone keeps warm this winter.
A School Song
The Year 2 suggestion box had a suggestion for a whole school song and the council agreed that they wanted to go ahead and find a song that represented the school. After looking at the words to several songs, the children in the council chose the school song 'Give it all you got'.
Before sharing it with the whole school, they asked 5GH to sing it with them ready to share in the music assembly.
What have 2021/22 school council achieved?
Mrs Gould and the school council met with Mrs Roberts (the school computing lead) to discuss what should happen if children come across something inappropriate when using the internet / social media. The council worked together to produce a flow chart for children and staff to show what should happen and who it should be reported to.
The school council worked with PCSOs Kirsty Newton and Paul Ellis-Feather. The children learnt about the dangers and the consequences of speeding.
Cllr Jeanette Sunderland, Becky James (the Team Leader for the Road Safety team) - and Andrew Smith (Principle Traffic and Highways Engineer) met with Mrs Gould and the school council to discuss their concern over the dangerous parking and speeding traffic on Highfield Road. Andrew had received and read the letters from Year 5 and wanted to help.
Our school council met to continue their road safety campaign. They designed posters reminding parents to park safely and for the public to observe the speed limit outside school.
Our enthusiastic school council met parents at the gates and handing out their road safety leaflets. They focused the parents' attention to the dangers of parking on the yellow lines outside school.
The school council planned a Break the Rules day to raise money to support the local community event Wrose Carnival.
The council planned Easter activities to raise money for the school. With the activities planned, they raised £498.
The school council has raised money through a variety of events.
The school council designed a Super Bloom garden to celebrate The Queen's Jubilee. They applied for the Super Bloom pack from the Tower of London.
Our school council created a Jubilee garden using the seeds from the Super Bloom project.
The Super Bloom celebrates the Platinum Jubilee of Her Majesty the Queen at the Tower of London, where a spectacular, colourful, vibrant field of flowers will fill and transform the Tower's moat. In spring 2022, over 20 million seeds will be sown in the moat from carefully designed seed mixes.
Day of Action
Today, the school council, Mrs Gould and a group of Year 5 children worked on a Day of Action. The children worked with some of our local police officers. They learnt how to use a speed cameras to track the speed of the vehicles passing our school.
The police explained the importance of keeping a safe speed on our roads. They also found out about the role of our local police officers. The children got shown how to use the protective equipment and they got to go inside the police van. They even got to use the sirens and lights. It was a very noisy morning.
During our Day of Action, some children wanted to work with local Community Wardens completing some litter picking activities around the school perimeter. The children enjoyed the activity but could not believe how much litter there was!
The children also found out about the role of our local fire fighters. They found out how to save people from rivers and lake, put fires out and cut vehicles. The children got to wear the protective clothing and go inside the fir engine.
Mrs Gould and the school council met with MP Imran Hussain to show him the wonderful equipment we recieved from the Morissons Good to Grow vouchers. Blakehill saved the highest number of vouchers out of 7000 school.
Well done and thank you to our parents for your support.
What has the School Council achieved?
2020 /21
- Made the decision that pupils line up on their House Teams instead of by gender e.g. boys and girls
- Introduced a school tie to the school uniform
- Decided that school ties should have a coloured stripe running through it, representing the colour of Blakehill's 4 house teams: KESTREL, KINGFISHER, JAVELIN, JUPITER
- Revised the school lunch menu with Michelle (our school cook) to reflect the tastes and diets of our school
- Decided on themes/ areas of interest for the Curriculum Carousel learning units in KS2
In previous years we have:
- Put benches on the school field
- Raised over £1000 for Comic Relief
- Blakehill’s Got Talent
- World Book Day book swap
- New locks on toilet doors
- Mirrors in the UKS2 bathrooms
- Bradford City Day
- Letters to the council and a petition to reinstate our crossing patrol person
- Bun sales to raise money for the Philippines and Marie Curie
- Milk in KS2
- More home reading books and books for the classrooms
- Karaoke club at lunchtime
- More choice for school dinners
- Raised money for Grenfell Tower victims
- Raised money for the Brain Tumour Charity
- Bought new books for classrooms upon request
- Discussed and selected new playground markings for the KS1 playground
- Requested a track for the daily mile
- Organised a budget to buy plants for classrooms.
- Named the School Library
- Ordered additional playground equipment