Our School Council and Eco Council

These groups play a vital role at Gorseybrigg and we involve all our children in the process. The children have many successes to celebrate!

Both councils have two members from each year group (Y1 - Y6), with School Council also having 6 members from Y6. Reception and Nursery children meet as a whole class and send their ideas to meetings. Each council has its' own special remit and we are so proud of all the work they do to make our school better; they come to every meeting full of ideas and proposals!

We meet at least every two to three weeks to discuss and debate a range of issues and the agenda is set by both pupils and staff. The councils have their own noticeboard, take assemblies, minute meetings, run fund raising events and are a very important part of our school improvement team. Classes hold regular meetings with their councillors to feed back meeting agendas, share minutes and discuss new ideas to bring. Every councillor is elected yearly following a proper election by their peers, where they present to the class the reasons why they should be chosen. It is always hotly contested! We are so proud of each and every one of them, they take their role very seriously and do a brilliant job.

Eco Council Announcement

In July 2022 we were incredibly proud to be awarded our Eco Schools Award - with distinction! Our new councillors will be carrying on the good work and helping to make our school even more environmentally friendly. Well done everyone!

Between 2018 and 2024 these are some of the other improvements our brilliant councillors worked on:-

Looking at reward systems in school, helping decide our school values and making decisions for rewards every year.
Taking part in our Online Safety Committee meetings and inputting ideas from a pupil perspective.
Completing the Action Plan for Eco Schools, identifying 3 key targets that we have begun to work on.
Debating curriculum changes and sharing pupil responses to the learning happening in our classrooms.
Identifying outdoor areas in school to develop - a quiet reading area and an Eco Garden. These are currently nearing completion
Discussing ideas for a child-led behaviour code (including leading on an assembly).
Supporting the development of our new Library space, including fundraising ideas to buy books, collecting ideas for books to buy and working with our Literacy Leads to select class books from the Library Service.
Approving attendance awards, including a trophy.
Deciding on the continuation of the visiting pantomime into school.
Raising lots of money for many worthy causes that they have chosen
Running stalls at fairs and events
Helping run the second hand uniform stalls

Plans for 2023-24 are as follows:

Our new councillors for this academic year were all elected in September 2023. Our plans so far are as follows:

Complete work on our quiet area - named by the council as "Serenity Square". The council will be choosing new seating and storage for books, games and drawing equipment
Improve the front area of school with planters and seating
Complete our Eco Garden - our pond and bird hide will hopefully be finished very soon!
Getting involved with marine based charities as part of our Eco School Award
Getting more bins around school.
Improving parking in the mornings with some signs to remind people to park sensibly
Getting a weather station for the front of school.
Helping complete our Eco Schools project!
Starting an Eco newsletter and a School Council newspaper
Working with Miss Hollis, our school cook, to improve our school dinners for everyone, making them even more popular and healthy!

Charlotte, (our Eco Council clerk) showing how to make a bird box and plant strawberries for the eco garden. She is now our minute taker and does a brilliant job!

February 2023 - UPDATE

Our Eco-Council proudly announced in their assembly today that we have been successful in securing a £320,000 grant as part of the government's Public Sector Decarbonisation Scheme. This has been the result of several years of work and means that we will be able to replace our very old gas boilers, install solar panels on sections of the roof and properly insulate the building.
Work should be starting fairly soon but will hopefully not be too disruptive to the children. More information to follow. We are all very proud.

Bee Bombs Feb 2023

In February the children had great fun throwing bee bombs they had made earlier. These bee bombs will hopefully flourish in our garden, attracting bees and other wildlife. Thank you for your continued support of our eco council and the work that they do.

Eco Council January 2024

Our children presented an assembly about our latest Eco Action Plan, and let everyone know about how our building project was going!