Every year, schools across the State of Michigan send out climate and culture surveys to their students to evaluate their campuses and buildings. While taking the pulse of your organization is a widely accepted best-practice, many of us ask the question, “Are we getting the true voice of our students?” At Bay City Western High School, staff and administration have taken what was at one time a yearly survey, and turned it into a comprehensive feedback loop between students, staff, and building leaders.
“How do we get their true voice, and how do we get them to speak up?”
Each Tuesday, staff identifies a group of students to participate in the “What’s Up Warriors” meeting for the week. All students in the building are entered into a random-generator app. Staff selects 10-15 students to participate in that week’s discussion. (If a student is selected, they are given the option of declining participation.)
Students meet first-thing Wednesday morning in a conference room that is used as a collaboration space. Staff members, typically from the building’s PBIS team, facilitate conversations with those students centered around one to two anchor topics. Examples include student parking, lunch/food service, school dances, as well as culture, climate and much more. Some sessions are conducted as a round-table discussion. In groups that “need the ice broken” a little bit more, they may do a 4-corners activity, or start with some random, non-building-related questions as a warm-up. At the heart of the sessions, Western staff are looking to uplift student voice, and make consistent improvements to their campus.
“Sometimes, what’s important to us is much different than what’s important to students,” Western Principal Judith Cox said. “We may be concerned about dual enrollment procedures, while the kids are more concerned with the playlist for prom.”
In order to encourage students to open up, Cox has found that having a small group of student council members help to co-facilitate these groups, alongside the teachers, has helped students get more comfortable, and to more readily open up during sessions. (Providing fresh donuts from a local Bay City bakery doesn’t hurt either!) By having all students in the pool of names, staff is able to consistently get feedback from a large cross-section of students in the building who participate in a vast array of clubs and activities.
“Getting students in a venue where they feel comfortable, it’s really quite profound what comes out from kids that are not always at the forefront of student leadership in our building,” Western Assistant Principal Jake Voisine said.
Feedback from “What’s Up Warriors” is shared out with staff in several ways, including at staff meetings, e-mail recaps and even posters by the copy machine. At the end of the day, Cox said the concept is simple: “What are we doing well, and what do we have the opportunity to level up in the building?”
For schools considering using a model like this to uplift student voice, Cox and Voisine say that laying concrete parameters, and being prepared to “make dynamic changes on the fly” are important.
“Helping students to understand that they can’t make it personal, that there is value to their input, and that there are no right or wrong answers really helps students to open up consistently,” Cox said.
While the “What’s Up Warriors” initiative is constantly evolving, Voisine was quick to outline two of the major things he has learned.
“You have to be willing to give grace to the process, and you have to be willing to be vulnerable to the feedback you receive,” he said.
In a world of constantly improving technology, it would be easy for Western Staff to send out a Google Form with a series of questions. For the Warriors however, it’s about the human side of the interaction. Sitting face to face, looking eye to eye, and having deep conversations that lead to true school improvement.