Student Council Minutes 23.01.12.

ATTENDANCE.

PK – Andy, Maisie

Morg - Sara

Powys – Gerry

Gwynedd – Juan, Karl

Whitaker – Tim, Albert

Tice – Miriam, Emma

Sunley – Eliza, Theo

AGENDA.

* Calendar.

* Constitution.

* Alcohol review.

* Kitchen van etiquette.

DISCUSSION.

Calendar. We decided that the potential Chairs and Vice-Chairs will run on the 31^st January and be elected by the 6^th February, Peer Listeners by 18^th March, House Reps by 25^th March and the rest of the Reps by 1^st April.

Constitution. There’s a document that defines how Student Council is set up. Changing – Secretary to Vice Chair, coordination of various House Rep systems – more responsibility but if operating can save us time in future. VICE-CHAIR IS SPELLED WITH A HYPHEN. Can we extend Board of Governors’ student representative on Academics, Pastoral etc meetings?

Alcohol review. AWOOOOOOOOOOOOOO JTopics so far are alternative punishments, drunk dorm-mates, alternatives to drinking/ what non-drinkers do, origin of extreme cases, how the culture of it spreads to first years and where it takes place. Each group will produce a summary of what they have concluded so that everyone can know all of the results. BE THERE.

Kitchen van etiquette. IT IS FIRST COME, FIRST SERVE i.e. IF YOU ARE THERE LAST DO NOT JUMP ON THE VAN IN FRONT OF OTHERS. IT IS A PRIVILEGE NOT A RIGHT TO TAKE THE KITCHEN VAN. PLEASE BE POLITE. And enjoy your free rides.

First code free. Having to leave the house even if you have first code free, is not because of the cleaning ladies but  people skipping codes – Staff find people do it less with this rule.

Student Council Minutes 16.01.12.

AGENDA.

- Breakfast room TV

- Student Council efficiency

- CCTV camera

- Mocks and midterm reports

- Heating in the Carrel Units and History

- Maintenance

- University letters opened

DISCUSSION.

- Breakfast room TV. The TV is currently not working but we think it will be resolved soon.

- Student Council efficiency. We should be aware of bringing up topics that are not relevant to Staff-Student Council and to waste time repeating topics in both Student and Staff-Student Council. If we better organise tasks for individuals to do then we can solve this problem.

- CCTV camera. The camera the school intend to implement is only to film the outside gate to look at who is entering the school that shouldn’t be. It will probably only checked when police involved and is not to catch night-riders or monitor students. The other entrance to the school is locked at night.

- Mocks. Mocks are: the only occasion apart from the IB we can do every paper we will take; harder than the real IB as we have less time; so that we don’t get too confident and revise hard enough; in case we can’t enter the real exam (medical reasons etc.) the grades can be used to predict us a final grade. Midterm reports are: grades for third term, some teachers consider mock grades to be a part of these.

- Heating in the Carrel Units and History. It is cold. Frances will email Nick Lush.

- Maintenance. New suggestion (check last week’s minutes) to make maintenance jobs in houses more efficient. There will be a meeting for the Maintenance Reps on the 24^th at break in the Great Hall and houses should elect first year reps if the second year reps don’t want to be involved.

- University letters. University letters have been found opened in pigeon holes. These are private letters. Frances will ask Sally if they can be kept in the ACO for us to collect instead.

- Alcohol review. This is not about attacking the Code of Conduct; it is about what we can do as students to change the social aspects of the drinking culture. There will be break-out groups similar to in the Conferences (small discussion groups led by voluntary student/staff leaders) and notes of the discussions will be taken to find what we can do to solve the issues. There may be some standardised questions for all groups and then all of the feedback will be put in one final document.

Currently the suggested break-out groups are:

Drunk dorm-mates – whether it is your responsibility to contact a member of staff if you are worried about a dorm-mate/friend.

Punishments – what alternative and more constructive punishments may be for those caught drinking and whether punishment for under and over-age drunkenness should be different and how so.

Alternatives to drinking – what the most successful alternatives would be which would be fun on the weekend. Could there be more sports events in particular, as these are good at bringing all of the school together.

Origin of extreme cases – Like hospitalisation and parties which get out of hand, why do they happen?

Geography – where does the drinking take place and what are the implications of this?

First year spread – what the impact of first years starting to drink is. Why and how it happens. What can be done to those who come to AC as drinkers and influence others? Why is drinking expected and why does it become a habit?

What do non-drinkers do at the weekends?

11.01.12 Staff-Student Council

AGENDA.

John Walmsley

Alcohol review

Alcohol alternative initiatives

Bikes

Light outside Bradenstoke

Face-to-Face activities

Printing credits

Maintenance

Night Staff contact

DISCUSSION.

John Walmsley. Is excited to work with us J

Alcohol review. The date for the Alcohol review is Thursday 26^th January 4:30 – 5:30pm in the Bradenstoke Hall. New suggestions of how this should be run were that we could have a plenary when the break-out groups come back together and that this could perhaps be on another day. IF YOU WANT TO LEAD A DISCUSSION (ANYONE IS WELCOME TO, ON ANYTHING) then come to Student Council on Monday, just for five minutes. WE WANT TO KNOW WHAT YOU THINK J

Alcohol alternative initiatives. The problem with having alternatives to alcohol at AC is that we tend to talk about them more than do them. Sarah Hamilton has come up with a Social Rep scheme 

- 2 Social Reps from each house

- Elected by the House Parents and next year with input by the current Social Reps

- They will be responsible for whole school events as opposed to the Entertainment Reps who are responsible mainly for in-house activities

- They will create a calendar of events to add to the diary to make sure there are always fun alternatives to the pub at the weekend.

Bikes. Students have had bikes/ bike parts stolen over break. We have four bike-sheds and we suggested putting gates with locks on them. The Staff suggested the crime was less during term time and that bikes be stored in the houses over breaks.

Light outside Bradenstoke. Will be sorted by the end of the week and there is also now one on the concrete path up from the seafront.

Face-to-Face Activities. We discussed whether more face-to-face activities would be possible. The problem is having enough transport. We suggested that Services focus on increasing the amount of face-to-face i.e. MEMS working Brownies and more one-off sessions like litterpicks, story reading etc. One of John’s aims was to have more contact with local schools . The netball team in Llantwit and Transition Llantwit – a sustainability project say that AC students are always welcome. Also, if students can organize events the school are happy to support them.

Printing credits clarification. Different amounts of printing credits are given depending on how much coursework the term has i.e. third term has most credits. IF STUDENTS NEED THINGS PRINTING FOR ACTIVITIES, STUDENTS SHOULD EMAIL ELECTRONIC COPIES OF THE DOCUMENT TO ADRIAN WHO WILL PRINT.

Maintenance. The ‘maintenance book’ idea or a similar system should be organised with the Maintenance Staff.

Night Staff contact. The Staff and Night Staff agree that Night Staff contact in an emergency is a problem and think a pager or a walky-talky linked to the main phone system is the most likely solution. The Senior Staff said that in a real emergency it is acceptable to contact any member of staff on campus.
There is no mobile coverage on 2/3 campus which is a problem in emergencies. Maintenance are looking at introducing walky - talkies which can be contacted from any internal phone and also at pagers similar to ILB have. In terms of ambulance and medical response, there is no way we can increase how outside people can get to us as we are so remote but the current response time is around 45 minutes and the Staff consider that to be fairly good.

Student Council Minutes 09.01.12.

ATTENDANCE.

Pentti Kouri – Maisie, Andy

Morgannwg – Sara

Powys – Gerry, Shreya

Gwynedd – Karl, Laura

Whitaker – Tim

Tice – Emma, Miriam

Sunley – Theo

AGENDA.

* Mubarak and Hannah

* Lost and Found system

* Graduation Reps

* Thematic Discussion

* Night Staff contact

* Alcohol review

* Bikes

* £5 printing credits

* Review of activity choosing process

* Maintenance

* Staff-Student Council Agenda

DISCUSSION.

- Mubarak and Hannah. Less than half school voted and the votes gave pretty even results for the three songs. We flipped a coin and the song will be ‘Don’t Stop Me Now’ by Queen.

- Lost and Found system. From now on, ALL LOST AND FOUND ITEMS NOW GO TO JULIE GILES IN THE PORTER’S OFFICE. IF YOU HAVE LOST SOMETHING, CHECK FOR IT THERE QUICKLY SO THAT JULIE ISN’T SWIMMING IN A SEA OF OUR JUNK. YOU CAN STOP SENDING LOST EMAIL NOW, AWOOO.

* Graduation Reps. The Graduation Reps are now organised and are working together.

* Thematic discussion. There will no longer be an Induction review. Now that John Walmsley is here, the Service one can be organised at some point soon.

* Night Staff Contact. There has been a problem with contacting Night Staff quickly enough in emergencies over the past term and we want to find a way to change this. See Staff-Student Council minutes later, for details.

* Alcohol review. We organised a date for the review of the use of alcohol at AC which will be a whole-school discussion separated into small break-out groups, similar to in the AC Diploma conferences. Details to be confirmed.

* Bikes. People have had bikes destroyed and tampered with last term and over the holidays. We will take this issue to Staff-Student Council to find a better alternative.

* Printing Credits. We want to clarify how printing credits are assigned each term as the amount seems to alternate. This will be clarified at Staff-Student Council.

* Review of activity choosing process. We discussed whether unofficial activities can count towards CAS requirements. THEY CAN. JUST TELL YOUR TUTOR THAT YOU HAVE COMMITTED TO SOMETHING AND GET THEM TO CHECK WITH THE ACTIVITY LEADERS IF THEY WANT MORE DETAILS.

* Maintenance Staff. Maintenance problems in the houses often take a long time to fix and there is a difference in how well Maintenance issues are organised in each house. We will suggest a system that worked well in PK to Staff-Student Council which is to have a book with the issue, dorm, date requested and date fixed that could keep a better monitoring of issues at hand.

* Staff Student Council Agenda

Alcohol review

Alcohol alternative initiatives

Bikes

Light outside Bradenstoke

Face-to-Face Activities

Printing credits clarification

Maintenance

Night Staff contact

Student Council Minutes 05.12.11.

ATTENDANCE.

PK – Maisie, Andy

Morgannwg – Sara

Powys – Shreya, Rune

Gwynedd – Karl

Whitaker – Tim, Albert

Tice – Emma, Michael

Sunley – Eliza, Theo

AGENDA.

1.       Health Centre

2.       Night Staff

3.       Board of Governors’ Meeting

4.       Printing Credits

5.       Drunk Dorm-mates

6.       Alternative punishments

7.       Games with Frances

DISCUSSION.

Health Centre. Something should be posted outside the Health Centre door, in houses and at the Dining Hall if the nurses aren’t there and emails should be sent around.

Night Staff. There has been problems with contacting Night Staff in emergencies in the past. It was suggested that in very dangerous situations we should be able to wake up House Parents. Walky-talkies which would be connected to the phone number available to students was suggested. This issue will go to Staff-Student Council next term. It was also clarified that they can enter dorms if they have complaints concerns from other students, health reasons (drunk/ill) or there is suspicion of rule-breaking. If you are uncomfortable with knowing when the Night Staff might come into your dorm, ask your House Parents for clarification and to inform you if they do it regularly.

Board of Governors’ Meeting. We took the current position on the IT discussion, the possibility of a student representative in Governor meetings, a summary of Student Council minutes, the question of the direction the school is going in and the balance between academics, service, mission etc. to the meeting which was very positive and minutes of this will follow.

Printing Credits. Second years were wondering if it would be possible to have extra printing credits to print coursework at the end of term. Ask your teachers who can contact IT to arrange this so that they don’t have to deal with students emailing them all their coursework.

Drunk dorm-mates. The question is whether students should tell on drunk dorm-mates or not, especially in cases where their safety is at risk. This will be taken to Staff-Student Council and we will discuss the issue with Nick Lush at another time and bring it up in the alcohol discussion next term.

Alternative punishments. Alternatives to current punishments for drinking and smoking were discussed. This discussion will continue next term. Current suggestions are collecting rubbish from fields etc., collecting cigarette ends and packets, detention. It was discussed whether there should be a standard procedure or whether it should be case-specific.

 

Student Council 28.11.11.

ATTENDANCE.

PK - Maisie

Morgannwg - Sara

Powys – Shreya, Gerry, Shanna

Gwynedd – Juan, Karl

Whitaker – Tim, Albert

Tice – Emma, Miriam, Tom

Sunley – Eliza, Theo, Rebecca

AGENDA.

* House inspections

* Graduation Reps

* Paul Motte leaving

* New rules

* Alcohol

* Pastoral review

* Drunk bitches

* Health Centre staff absence from Health Centre

DISCUSSION.

House inspections. Frances will ask Houseparents to clarify at House Meeting the policy of House Inspections that happen each Monday and to put up a summary of the policy on the noticeboards.

Graduation reps. Clara, Tom, India, Rebecca, Marlene, Carys B, Manin, Ilya, Laurens are this year’s Graduation Reps and will be emailed to remind them to meet with the Development Office to begin working on their tasks.

Paul Motte leaving. We’re planning things… Ice Ice Baby…

New rules. Another long discussion. Next Staff-Student Council we will discuss why often now the system of ‘warnings’ goes straight to stricter punishments, whether and why there may be more house inspections, the point that the infliction of suspensions is too wide and is not reserved for extreme cases anymore, possible alternative punishments, concern of the frequency of Night Staff visits to dorms.

Alcohol. Rune will email Nick Lush to confirm a date for a discussion/review, possible after Christmas.

Pastoral review. Last year the review of the pastoral care system was a survey in house meeting. This year it was suggested that something more structured would be useful and if there was a survey again, students should be reminded to fill it out sensibly and maturely as there were problems concerning this last year and the surveys weren’t taken seriously. Bill will email Nick Lush to find out the details of this.

Drunken dorm-mates/ friends. We discussed the issue of whether dorm-mates/ friends should tell the Houseparents or Night Staff if someone is too drunk. We decided to bring this up in the alcohol discussion once this is scheduled.

Health Centre staff absence from Health Centre. Sometimes the staff are not there and there is no warning beforehand that they won’t be. Emma will email the nurses to ask them to notify us more clearly of times they will be absent.

 

Staff-Student Council 27.11.11.

ATTENDANCE.

PK – Andy,

Morg – Sara, Paul

Powys – Shreya, Gerry

Gwyn - Karl

Whit - Tim

Tice – Miriam, Emma

Sun – Eliza, Theo

AGENDA.

- Alcohol review

- Duty House

- Lost and Found

- Night Reports

- Late night visits Night Staff

- New rules

DISCUSSION.

Alcohol review. The Senior Staff said they would look into organising a whole college event before Christmas where we could continue discussion on solutions to the drinking culture.

Duty House. The Senior Staff felt that making a rota for Duty House in which houses were assigned to events instead of every weekend would be unnecessary stress and would not always work because of unforeseen events etc.

Lost and found. The Senior Staff said that it would be a good idea to have all lost and found items sent to Julie and that the cleaning staff etc should be warned of this. They suggested a trial next term. There could also be a list to check items in and out so that people can check for their items easily.

Night Reports. We asked for clarification of what it meant that night reports being sent to teachers would be suspended ‘for now’. The Senior Staff said that it would continue not to be sent unless something happened which meant they felt it was necessary to start sending them again. If it would come back, they said the reasons would be properly explained.

Late night visits Night Staff. The Senior Staff said they would clarify the Night Staff policies by email. A male Night Staff can enter a female dorm but there are always at least one female Night Staffs on duty so it would normally be a female. They enter only if they are concerned there is a problem in the dorm and usually only if invited in (unless the situation is urgent). The Senior Staff said the Night Staff are very sensitive towards doing this but if there is a problem with any of the Staff at Atlantic College, Senior Staff need to be made aware of it.

New rules. The Senior Staff said that the issue of having to ask house parents for permission vs. being asked for permission wasn’t a big one and that being asked might encourage students to take the opportunity as the norm.

The Senior Staff agreed that more structured, positive solutions should be put in place as punishments for breaking the new night-studying rules though, such as meetings with teachers, tutors and house parents and help to make strategic plans to break such habits. They still stuck by gating as a positive measure in certain cases.

Finally, they said that when the new rules were started, they weren’t seen as new rules since before this ‘lights out’ was technically 11:30 – they saw it merely as an adjustment to how current rules are implemented but apologised for the way students weren’t warned about this and said that a positive alternative to the way it was done would be to have a meeting with all first year students and staff near the end of the year if there is a need to discuss changes in the Code of Conduct.