Pupil Voice

Leaders engage with pupils at Dean Trust Wigan to create a positive school culture,

Why do we undertake pupil voice?

• Engaging with pupils about their school experience is a great way to reinforce our high expectations of all pupils in the school, and discover the extent to which these are embodied in leaders’ and staff’s day-to-day interactions with pupils.
• This process allows leaders to focus their attention on the education provided by the school. We believe that a focus on this area is associated with better outcomes for pupils.
• Engaging with pupils regularly to listen to their experiences and ideas helps leaders create coherence and consistency across the school so that pupils benefit from effective teaching and consistent expectations, wherever they are in the school.

How do we go about engaging with pupils in a thoughtful and positive way to develop our culture and improvement at Dean Trust Wigan ?

Engagement opportunities that are focused and have purpose.

Regular Pupil voice sampling with feedback: We aim to ensure every pupil in school has the opportunity to feedback to us on what our school culture and experience is like. We also aim to ensure that every pupil has the opportunity to feedback on how we can continue to improve our culture and experience through regular surveys led by staff and pupils. We operate a You said/We did approach for our regular surveys. In addition we also engage in consultation with pupils on key issues that affect the whole community such as our summer 2021 consultation on site safety ad our summer 2022 consultation on changes to the school day. The voice of our pupils matters.

Pupil Leadership: We aim to provide pupils with meaningful structured opportunities to understand how to be responsible, respectful, active citizens who contribute positively to society. This is a key feature of our commitment to ensure pupils know how to discuss and debate issues and ideas in a considered way. Many of our pupils have had leadership opportunities at primary school that they choose to build on in their time with us. Some pupils develop an interest in and realise their talent later. We provide a number of leadership routes that pupils can apply to  part of. These groups meet regularly with senior leaders to help shape our school community and help us to deliver our mission.  Our committees include;

• Literacy Leaders
• Pastoral Leaders
• Subject Leaders
• Inclusion
• Form Representatives

Unicef Rights Respecting School

Together young people and our school community learn about children’s rights, putting them into practice every day. Our Rights Respecting School programme is taught in PSHE and assemblies and shared with staff in training ad briefing and in our everyday actions. Our programme is not just about what children do but also, importantly, what adults do. At DTW children’s rights are promoted and realised, adults and children work towards this goal together.

There are four key areas of impact; wellbeing, participation, relationships and self-esteem.

The difference that a Rights Respecting School makes goes beyond the school gates, making a positive impact on the whole community.

• Children are healthier and happier
• Children feel safe
• Children have better relationships
• Children become active and involved in school life and the wider world

Click here to find out more about  The Rights Respecting Schools Award | UNICEF UK