500 young people attend first Cost of the School Day Big Meet Ups

It was great to gather so many Cost of the School Day Voice network members together at one time, with more than 500 young people from 35 Primary schools and 15 secondary schools across Scotland joining the first Big Meet Up online sessions. 

Each session, one for primary schools and one for secondaries, focused on how Cost of the School Day Voice groups can raise awareness in their own schools. 

We heard from fantastic young people who’ve found straightforward but exciting ways to do this and who are clearly enjoying leading the push to get the Cost of the School Day message out to everyone in their school.

Annie and Cameron from Boghall Primary School told everyone why the decided to make a video on X (formerly Twitter):

“We brainstormed ideas for the video, and we thought that if we can make people laugh, we can get people to come to our drop in. So we made a funny kind of video so that we could catch more attention. And we also thought no one can say no to these cute faces!” 

Molly and Lincoln spoke about the event that the video was promoting, and how they made sure that they offered parents and carers lots of different ways to take part in their survey:

 “We had a parent session to ask what parents felt were the costs of the school day and ask how we could use our participatory budget to reduce the cost. They came up with lots of interesting ideas for us to try. Because we wanted to ask even more parents, we set up an iPad and had a QR code on posters at a parents’ evening.“

West Calder High School learners Kirsty and Georgia had some great tips for making sure social media posts stand out. 

“We promote our events on a regular basis through our social media platforms. This has been a very powerful way of catching the attention of our local MSP as we tag them, and then our posts get more attention too. We continue to raise awareness of cost of school day through our weekly snapshots which are sent to all of our families and people within our community.”

#IWILL Ambassadors Heather Bryson and Lochlan Murdoch described how they had been getting their messages out there, on social media, in podcasts and through events and Kelly Cai, a member of the Child Poverty Action Group London Youth Panel since it started in 2022, said:

“I think it's important that young people's voices are heard because we provide fresh and new perspectives and innovative ideas to the table that other older generations might not have, and our perspectives can inspire new approaches to challenges and can drive progress in different areas, especially if it's an issue that you care about.” 

Huge thanks to all the young people and group leaders who came along. The energy in the (virtual) room was fantastic and showed how much enthusiasm all young Voice network members have for making change happen in their school communities. We are looking forward to welcoming even more young people to the next Big Meet Up!

More information about the Cost of the School Day Voice network