Hello, my name is Nicholas Dewhurst, I am a regular year 12 student here at boys high. I have been part of the student forum for 2 years (both years I applied), I helped organise the 40-hour famine, I am one of the regional representatives in the school strike for climate committee and I am the chief technology operator for the cosmos debating championship (a worldwide, online debating competition). Why should you vote for me? I’ve got experience. I know how to get the most out of the board meetings that I will be sitting in. I know what questions to ask and how to interpret the answers. If you vote for me, I will use this powerful knowledge to get what you want out of it. I'm also as unbiased as is mentally possible. Since I started as a year nine at this school, I have been fascinated by the fact that everyone has different experiences in life resulting in different opinions. I put in the effort to understand every possible angle to a situation before I decide on it. This means that I will try my best to understand your perspective before I make decisions. And finally, I take action. An idea is merely a dream unless you act on it, and a dream by itself is entirely useless. That is why I will try my very hardest to directly cause a change in this school. I think about what the final product will look like and how it will operate directly from the start. None of this brainstorming that takes years to complete. That is why all of my promises are already planned out. I know exactly how they will be implemented, I just need to be in a higher rank to start them. You can help me get there if you vote for me. I promise a student survey every half term so I can understand your perspective, more predictable haircut rules so all students know exactly where the line is, more printers in the library to lower the congestion when a due date comes along, and trousers for juniors. All this stuff will only go into effect if you vote for me.

Student Surveys Every Half Term

The purpose of a student representative is in the title; a representative for the students. That is why I propose my first promise of anonymous surveys every half term. These will be sent out for everyone to fill out during form time or silent reading. The purpose of this is so I know exactly what you want. At the start of the year, it will have vague open-ended questions so you can say what you personally want. Then over the year, as I narrow it down, it will turn into votes and tick boxes so I can get the specifics. Most of my offers to the board of trustees will be based on what I hear from you through the surveys.

Predictable Haircut Rules

Next, I promise more predictable haircut rules. Rule 25.2 of the school rules states that “Haircuts must be neat and appropriate for school: neither long nor too short, and must be cut to the satisfaction of the Rector or Deputy Rector”. The only fine lines that exist are no hair products and no side boards beyond the ear lobe. This is not good enough for a rule that students get pulled up for daily. How can we predict what the rector’s opinion of an appropriate hair cut is? The rector might just be having a bad day and that would mean that you are actually breaking the rule. This is just bad rule writing. It should be written with measurable statistics instead of "what the rector is ok with". The result of this terrible rule writing is that we don't know where the line is. Deans, teachers, and the senior management team all have different standards of appropriate haircuts. Your hair is part of your identity and it not ok to have this level of uncertainty when talking about someone's sense of self. I'm not proposing that we remove the rule, I'm just proposing that we make the line clearer so we can tell if we are breaking the rule or not without someone's opinion being involved.

More Printers In The Library

Thirdly, I promise more printers in the library. In the staff room, there is a room dedicated to printers for only the staff to use. There are at least 3 printers in there, whilst we only get 1 crowded printer in the library. Why do the teachers need so many printers when they usually tell us to print our own worksheets off? This single printer adds stress to our already stressed and busy lives. We’ve already got to worry about passing NCEA in the middle of a pandemic, why should stressing about your internal printing before the bell have to add to the pile? This gets even more stressful when a due date for every class line up. That is why I promise that we move a printer that isn’t being used much in another block to the library for student use.

Trousers For Juniors

And finally, Student rep after student rep has proposed it repeatedly without any action: trousers for juniors. This school is too strict. It prioritises tradition over student wellbeing for no other reason than “it’s always been done this way”. The school is blind to the fact that this is a fast-changing world, yes it may have been better “back in the day” but things change. Juniors are out in the winter with their skinny legs freezing off because of “tradition”, that grey jersey and black jacket ain't gonna do nothing to keep those legs warm. They say that "we had it hard back in our day so why are you complaining so much?" To that I say; you may have had it hard back then but that's no reason to make it hard for us now. You should be celebrating that the world is a better place, not complaining that it isn't your world. Small things like this are yet another obstacle that's put in place purposefully to make our life harder.

These 4 promises are only the smallest nibble of what I could change. but again, I can only make a difference if you vote for me.