Following up on our ongoing commitment to student voice, we recently brought together 26 student representatives from across our primary and secondary schools for a Trust Student Council meeting focused on our Entitlement and Enrichment offer.
A key feature of the sessions was welcoming visiting delegates from the Foundation for Education Development (FED). Sitting down with external education leaders, our young people shared their firsthand experiences of WPT’s Entitlement and Enrichment offer while actively helping to co-design the next steps for our curriculum, life skills and transition programmes.
Central to the discussion was the overwhelming enthusiasm students expressed for our Pledges framework. Representatives spoke with immense pride about their out-of-classroom learning, with Cultural Experiences – such as theatre visits and trips to places of worship – and Active Citizenship projects like community fundraising emerging as particular favourites. To build on this momentum and make recording the Pledges even easier, students put forward practical ideas to introduce dedicated form-time logging slots and student-accessible digital tracking tools.
Engaging directly with Trust leaders and visiting FED guests, our young leaders shared thoughtful, forward-thinking solutions to boost key aspects of their educational experience:
Enhancing essential life skills
Building on the strong foundations of our existing First Aid training, students expressed a keen desire to keep their skills sharp through regular, hands-on refresher modules covering real-world scenarios like EpiPen usage and open water safety.
Forward-thinking financial literacy
Our young people praised current budgeting activities and enthusiastically requested expanding financial education Trust-wide, focusing on modern digital topics such as safe online spending, card security, and navigating AI risks.
Expanding creative and wellbeing clubs
While celebrating our well-established sports provision, students championed adding even more diverse, non-sporting options to the extra-curricular calendar – including cooking, coding, mindfulness and sign language.
Inspiring curriculum and career horizons
Our primary children showed great excitement for expanding music instrument varieties, while secondary representatives advocated for flexible option blocks that preserve creative arts alongside languages. In Careers, students asked to build on successful guidance by introducing even more workplace visits and immersive encounters with guest professionals in medicine, engineering and tech.
Empowering peer-led transitions
To help Year 6 students step confidently into secondary school, the council proposed expanding our Year 7 and 8 Student Ambassador schemes to visit feeder primaries for Q&A sessions and guided support.
Rachael Skelton, Headteacher at The Gainsborough Academy and Student Council Leader, said: “The depth of discussion during the session was nothing short of remarkable. Our students reflected on what they already enjoy about our Enrichment offer, but also arrived with insightful, practical solutions to refine it for the future. We couldn’t be prouder of their contributions and we look forward to putting their ideas into practice across all our schools.”
The invaluable feedback from the meeting has been compiled into a Trust Executive Action Plan, ensuring our students’ voices continue to drive real change for all young people across WPT. A huge well done and thank you to all the student representatives, staff, and visiting FED delegates whose dedication, insight, and enthusiasm made this session such a success. We’re looking forward to the next!
