Parent Councils provide an important voice to the school community - offering a new perspective on educational developments and even influencing change at a local authority level.
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As Vanessa Henderson, a member of Kelso High School Parent Council, points out: 'A parent's voice can actually be more significant to Scottish Borders Council or even the Scottish Government, because they're used to dealing with traditional requests from educationalists, like 'We need more money to do this.''
Instead, parents' feedback shows education authorities that parents understand current issues in education - and what's more, they care. The Parent Council at Kelso High School has only been running for a year, yet it has already delivered tangible results. With Vanessa as the Parent Council's first chair, it grew into an effective group that represents the views of parents, students and the wider community.
Proactive approach
Keen to take a proactive approach to communicating with parents, the Parent Council made sure that one of its first actions was to request additional funding from the local authority. With this agreed, it immediately began to take an active role in educational developments.
The Parent Council participated in a radical review of the school year and the school week, even helping some feeder primaries to take part in the consultation process. It also launched a campaign for extra investment in the school building, a campaign that will come to fruition this year with the addition of a new classroom block.
When Scottish Borders Council launched major proposals to transform children's services, the Parent Council was keen to engage in the consultation process. It took a lead role in helping the school and Kelso community to voice their concerns around some of the proposals, aiming to encourage as many people as possible to respond. To achieve this, the council condensed the main points of the large consultation document into an easily digestible one-page flyer. The result was a very meaningful discussion around the new proposals.
'Our involvement was quite significant,' says Vanessa. 'Kelso as a voice was well heard and our concerns were acknowledged. We were dealt with very professionally - any questions we had were considered, we were given a response very quickly and anything we asked about was explained to us.'
Positive results
The approach of the Parent Council has always been a positive one, which puts forward thoughtful arguments rather than acting aggressively. As a result of the council’s involvement, some aspects of the local authority’s proposals were revised.
The measured approach and effectiveness of the Parent Council certainly impressed Charlie Robertson, the headteacher of Kelso High School. With many years' experience of school boards, Charlie had some initial reluctance towards Parent Councils. However, the Parent Council quickly built a relationship of trust and respect with the staff body at the school, and Charlie now welcomes the meaningful contribution it makes to school life. 'I'm very proud of the fact we've got a Parent Council,' he says. 'I value the support and advice they're able to give me.'
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