Greenfield’s First Student Conference – ‘Make it Matter’

Students from Greenfield Community Conference were given a wonderful opportunity to express themselves at their inaugural Student Voice Conference, co-ordinated by Greenfield Arts. The conference, ‘Make it Matter’, brought together students, staff, artists and invited guests to voice their ideas and have a say in their learning experience by bringing about a ‘call to action’.

The conference, held at the Xcel Centre, was a huge success with enthusiastic support from over 180 students and resulted in a ream of positive suggestions and actions to bring back to school to try and test. Four students from each mixed age tutor group were nominated to experience the occasion and act as ambassadors for their tutor group.

On arrival the students were gifted a conference bag to keep them going throughout the day. After a welcome speech by Phelan and Harley in Year 9 the work began! Following a range of research over the past few months it was time to put ideas to action. A range of student leaders led activities they had planned and took part in, including a doodle jam, inspirational talks and workshops – building post-it note rainbows, filling cut-out body shapes with skills and attributes and working in their house groups to suggest possible positive actions.

A big thank you to all the students involved, including the student leaders, the Newshounds and the Your Voice, Your Say group. Thank you also to the team of school staff and artists involved, including volunteer Philip, Nicola Golightly, Alex Elliott, Annie Rigby and filmmaker Laura Degnan who captured the amazing day on film.

Organiser Katy Milne, Director of Creativity at Greenfield Arts, was thrilled with the response of all involved. “This has been a great experience for the students, a rare opportunity for KS3 and KS4 to not only attend a conference but to be so instrumental in its planning, aims, objectives and organisation in a bid to ‘Make it Matter’. We look forward to seeing the ideas in action and understanding the impact they can make across the school and our wider community next term”.