Wellbeing Report

Student Action Team

One of our goals for this year has been to increase the opportunities for Student Voice.

Student voice describes the many ways which young people have opportunities to share their ideas and experiences to impact and transform their school community and learning environment. Current research supports the inclusion of student voice practices within our schools. It has been found that by giving student’s opportunities to participate in school decision making, it can re-engage them in the school community and increase student attachment to their school. Greater collaboration between students and teachers increases engagement, as students are able to express themselves about things that are important to them and have an impact on them.

To facilitate this goal, we have established a new student group, the Student Action Team. All students have been invited to attend these meetings, giving them an opportunity to contribute their ideas about improving their learning and continually enhancing our school community. The team meet each Wednesday at lunchtime, to share ideas and come up with strategies to improve things that they feel strongly about.

A few weeks ago the team was joined by the school architect, Anthony from Cotter Reid, and our business manager Mr Rob Malone. They were very interested to hear from the students about their ideas for improving the school facilities, contributing to the consultation process regarding our long term master plan. Anthony and Rob were very impressed with the interesting ideas and thoughts expressed by our students.

Here are some thoughts from our SAT members about their involvement in the team so far:

Ronan – ‘This year, I finally decided to become a leader for my house and I had an ambition to make a positive change in the Nazareth community as I have seen no change from past leaders. I was questioned as to how exactly I could change the community, how I could make my ambitions a reality. So I joined the Student Action Team with confidence that real change from student voice is a reality.’

Corrine - I wanted to be a part of the Student Action Team because I have noticed many things I think could be improved, and I wanted to share some of my personal ideas to make Nazareth a better school.

Ms Jacqueline Kol and Ms Mirella Venturini

Co-Directors of Wellbeing