Rights Respecting School

Rights Respecting School (RRS)

At St Catherine’s, we are committed to placing the values and principles of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) at the heart of our policies and practice. It is important to us that children recognise their rights but also learn how to respect and value the rights of others.

Through their experience of an inclusive rights-respecting school community, we want our children to develop the confidence to play an active role in their own learning and to speak and act for the rights of all to be respected locally and globally.

What does RRS look like at St Catherine’s?

As well as learning about children’s rights, through school and class assemblies, being a Rights Respecting School shapes our behaviour management. Every class draws up a class charter based on agreed rights, for example Article 12, “respect for the views of the child” and discusses what this looks like and how it is carried out in our school and wider community.

Our Rights Respecting Steering Group, also known as RRS Ambassadors, are a group of children from across the school who work to ensure that all members of our school community are made aware of the rights afforded to them through the UNCRC. They also ensure that they model the best way to respect the rights of others, making our school a happier, safer and more respectful place to learn and work.

What does a Rights Respecting Ambassador meeting look like at St Catherine’s?

Our RRS ambassadors meet with Miss Sonenfeld to discuss a variety of whole school issues including helping to run whole school focus days such as World Mental Health day and Anti-Bullying Week. We meet to discuss whole school initiatives that could be effectively implemented in the school to help positively impact our whole school community. For example, our RRS ambassadors launched a ‘Kindness Bingo Challenge’ across the school during our Anti-Bullying week. Our ambassadors have also met to share their classes opinions about what each of our school values (Faith, Integrity, Excellence, Love, Diversity) mean to them and how we can demonstrate these values in our school and wider community.

How can you help?
Here are some ways you can support our RRS approach:

Watch or read age appropriate news and discuss how it relates to children’s rights

Discuss topics your child is studying at school and how they relate to children’s rights

Discuss the week’s ‘Votes For Schools’ topic with your child and discuss how it links to children’s rights