What does it mean to be a Rights Respecting School?

Rights Respecting Schools is an award by the charity UNICEF. The award is for schools that are working towards children’s rights becoming an embedded part of their school ethos. It teaches children about the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and enables them to be Rights Respecting Global Citizens and advocates for fairness and social justice in our local community, our country and across the globe.

A rights-respecting school is a community where children’s rights are learned, taught, practised, respected, protected and promoted. Young people and the school community learn about children’s rights by putting them into practice every day.

Our Rights Respecting School Council

The St Luke’s Rights Respecting School Council is led by pupil representatives form Years 3-6. They teach pupils in all year groups about their rights and how to understand them. Mrs Walton meets with the group every two weeks.

The School’s Council is an ideal opportunity for pupils to get more involved in the way the school is run; it is after all their school. We respect and value the thoughts and opinions of our children and whilst it may not always be possible or practical to do everything they suggest, the children do have some fantastic ideas and are able to accept why some ideas may not work well for the school community.

The School Council benefits the whole school, pupils and teachers, because it provides opportunities for pupils to communicate their feelings as well as influence decisions that are made within school.

Councillors develop skills such as confidence, communication and negotiation. It is the responsibility of each Councillor to ensure that they express both their own views and the views of all the other pupils they represent.

Who would make a good school councillor?

Any child in the school can stand to be a school council rep for their class. It is not a decision made by teachers, nor do they have to be the cleverest person in the class. A good school councillor does need to have some of the following qualities though:

• A good listener and speaker
• A team player
• Interested to learn more about our school
• Keen to make a contribution to improving our school
• Able to represent the views of others in your year group
• Able and willing to speak to your class about the Council?
• Willing to give up some of your own time to this post
• Has lots of good ideas
• Sets a good example to others

Who can be a member of the school council?

Anyone!

We have a School Council with boys and girls representing their fellow pupils from each class from Year 3 to Year 6.

Each councillor is elected by their classmates at the beginning of the school year after a short presentation explaining why they should be elected. This develops children’s understanding of democracy. They also understand that with democracy comes responsibility.

Our School Council

A new school council is elected each year. One child is elected by their classes each year to represent their class at monthly School Council meetings. It’s a brilliant way of representing and contributing to our school.

This creates a central group that speaks on behalf of the whole school and makes decisions about school life. We value the opinions of our pupils and the School Council gives pupils a forum to share these opinions with the Head of School and other members of staff. Children take part in a range of opportunities to improve their school and raise issues and ideas.

What is a class charter?

Every class in school has discussed, agreed on and designed their own class charters. These consist of three or four articles that the whole class agree to focus on and incorporate into their day to day lives. The children have discussed what both the adults (Duty Bearers) and the children (Rights holders) have to do to ensure the rights are met and have included these on their charters. The Rights Respecting School Council have also created the playground and lunch hall charters.

How do children learn about the rights of the child?

Children at St Luke’s have different opportunities throughout the curriculum to explore the articles including PSHE sessions, assemblies and themed events throughout the year, including World Children’s Day. The children really enjoy these discussions as they explore new articles in relation to their life and see how the convention is followed in countries around the world. The teachers also actively plan lessons that are linked to the articles.

Our Mascot

This is Luke the Ox, our Rights Respecting School mascot. The Ox was designed by Catherine, who won our whole school competition in November 2024. Catherine was inspired by her research into St Luke and discovered that St Luke is represented in Christian art by an Ox. We are always looking out for fantastic Rights Respecting work happening around the school.

How can parents and carers help their child to know their rights?

• Spend time talking about the articles at home. https://www.unicef.org/rightsite/files/uncrcchilldfriendlylanguage.pdf
• Look at the local and worldwide news. Newsround is a child-friendly way of discussing important events happening around the world. These will often link with rights learning. 
• Talk about our ‘Article of the month’ which is also mentioned in the school newsletter.
• Join in with local charity events and school charity days.
• Take action for positive change in their local community e.g. litter pick
• Give an hour of your time to charity e.g. the homeless, elderly, a hospice.
• Encourage your child to take action for positive change in their local and global community. E.g. clear the plastics from our seas and oceans.

 

Celebrating Silver 

This award is granted by Unicef UK to schools that are embedding children’s rights throughout the school in their policies, practice and ethos. We are extremely proud of our children and our whole school community, as we have worked to promote children’s rights within our school. Our children spoke enthusiastically about our rights respecting journey and the impact on their interactions with others both in and out of school.  The UNCRC underpins all that we do in school and our Rights Respecting Silver Award is a lovely way to recognise this.

The UNCRC

The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child is displayed in classrooms and corridors in our school. We wrote to the Children’s Commissioner and asked her for these colourful posters to support us in our Rights Respecting Journey (Article 12: Respect for the views of the child)

 

The following link will direct you to a summary of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child:

Click here to see the UNCRC - Summary