School councils can be useful when properly run, but more modern and inclusive ways are needed to fully represent the student voice.
‘Student Voice’ is now written into DCSF guidance. It is a recognised part of school inspections. It impacts on school development plans. It is even deemed to deserve initial capital letters. The attention given to students’ views is seemingly greater now than it has ever been before. It is perhaps ironic, then, that most schools still rely on the most traditional mechanism around for listening to students: the school council.
In 2007 research commissioned by School Councils UK reported that 97 to 98 per cent of schools have a school council.
School councils are firmly entrenched as the most popular way of giving students a chance to express themselves. Worrying, then, that at an annual conference of the English Secondary Students’ Association (ESSA) only 8 per cent of students thought that their school council was effective. Some have jumped on statistics such as this as evidence that school councils don’t work. It is ESSA’s belief, however, that the real problem lies not in the mechanism, but in the way it is realised in schools.
Many school councils are badly run. Whatever you think of the theory behind them, this is shown time and again in research and anecdotal evidence. One of the frst problems is that many school councils are organised, chaired and have their agendas set by adults. Any mechanism for getting students to make decisions surely has to reflect that ethos in its own procedures. It is difficult to see how students can engage with and take ownership of their school, its teaching and learning, its curriculum and its buildings when how, when and what they discuss is dictated to them.