Student leadership at Marshland School - Te Rito Harakeke

Kia ora e te whānau

Firstly, thank you to all the parents, whānau and extended whānau who attended the Term 3 Learning Celebration yesterday.  It was an excellent way to finish an eventful term, and tamariki loved having an audience to share their learning about expression and communication in the performing arts.

Students at a full primary school (Year 1-8) like ours are provided with wonderful opportunities for leadership. These opportunities play a crucial role in shaping their personal growth, fostering a sense of responsibility, and preparing them for future success. In addition to having more access to these roles at a full primary, we also have the added advantage of cultivating student leadership from an early age, seeing potential, as tamariki transition across Learning Hubs at our school. 

Over this term, we have been reviewing student leadership roles and responsibilities for Senior (Toroa) students. We would like to thank those parents and whānau of Year 6-8 tamariki for contributing by providing feedback via a student leadership survey. 

This feedback confirmed what we had predicted about these roles in our school. Namely, student leadership roles are not as visible as they could be to other tamariki, parents and whānau across the school. This feedback also identified the need for parents to see role clarity and know about selection procedures to support their children in putting themselves forward for different roles. 

The reviewed student leadership roles for Year 8 tamariki in 2024 will be:

Mana Kaihautū (Heads of School) approximately 4 students 

Role: To lead school events and activities with the support of school staff. This includes meeting visitors to the school, leading Whānau Hui, engaging in Celebration of Learning, sharing perspectives on school-related matters and communicating updates to the school community. These leaders will pick up supportive leadership roles in other domains when required.

Kori Kaihautū (Sport Leaders) approximately 4 students

Role: To lead and promote physical activity across the school with the support of school staff. This includes organizing physical activities during play breaks, supporting whole-school sporting events, maintaining and distributing sporting equipment, and sharing perspectives on school physical activity programmes.

Hoa Kaihautū (Peer Leaders) approximately 4 students

Role: To enhance relationships between students across the school and positive peer interactions. This includes developing relationships with students from the Piwakawaka Learning Hub, providing peer mediation and support to younger students in the playground, supporting school-wide partnership or ‘house’ activities and identifying opportunities and sharing perspectives on school social and emotional wellbeing.

Kaitiāki Kaihautū (Environment Leaders) approximately 4 students

Role: To enhance the school's physical environment. Students will be involved in maintaining and identifying opportunities to develop the school’s physical environment. This includes sharing perspectives and decision-making on school signage, planting, playing areas and equipment and leading student involvement in gardening and other landscape-related activities.

Ahurea Kaihautū (Cultural Leaders) approximately 4 students

Role: To promote cultural awareness across the school to enhance student cultural identity. This includes leading Māori cultural activities and events, promoting Matauranga Māori (Te Reo Māori Tikanga Māori) across learning teams, greeting school visitors and leading performances.

Wharekai Kaihautū (Te Rito Cafe Leaders) approximately 30-40 students

Role: To support Te Rito Cafe systems and processes. This includes working the till, taking and delivering customer orders and working with the Cafe Manager to enhance Te Rito Cafe initiatives.

I shared the reviewed leadership structure with a group of our current Year 8 leaders today and enjoyed listening to their responses. They liked the idea of having a range of opportunities to suit student interests. For example, students will specialise in one area rather than spreading their energy across many leadership domains, as they do now. They also felt that this provided a clear picture of what each role or leader should be doing at different times throughout the year.

We will now work with our 2023 Student Leaders to trial different engagements and projects in preparation for the new structure. Our current leaders are eager to contribute to the school and were very excited by this opportunity. They talked about how they really enjoy opportunities to engage with others outside of school, as they did for the National Young Leaders event this term. They also enjoy engaging with younger tamariki through buddy and physical activity programmes, which will start up again in Term 3. 

We place significant value on student leadership and will continue to enhance opportunities to nurture leadership skills from an early age, including explicitly teaching the competencies through curriculum learning programmes. 

Below are some photos of our student leaders carrying out different roles and responsibilities across the school over the last week. This includes photos taken last week when our student leaders engaged with Christchurch Mayor Phil Mauger and our local councillor, Kelly Barber. 

We look forward to communicating more leadership engagements throughout Terms 3 and 4, but in the meantime, we hope you have a wonderful holiday period with friends and family. 

Noho ora mai nā (Stay well / take care of yourself)

Leigh Fowler