Schools and teachers celebrated at the Your UK Parliament Awards 2020

The Your UK Parliament Award 2020 winners have been announced with schools and teachers dominating the shortlist.

2020 marks the third year of the Your UK Parliament awards, which are designed to celebrate people across the UK who have taken action on issues they care about. The winning entries were chosen by a panel of MPs, Peers and independent judges, who were unanimously impressed by the work people are doing to connect their community with the UK Parliament and democracy.

A number of schools and teachers were recognised in the following categories:

School of the Year – Recognises schools which have taken action on an issue they care about and engaged with the UK Parliament on it.

The students of Torquay Girls’ Grammar School are passionate about climate change issues. At a school level they have initiated many changes; they started a vegetable garden, got single use plastic banned in the canteen and introduced meat-free Mondays.

As under 18 year olds are unable to vote, they created a forum to influence policy makers instead. They started an e-petition ‘Consult With Focus Groups Of Young People When Creating Climate Change Policy’ to ensure young people had a say on decisions about climate change, and created a video to promote it.

Using their lunchtimes to spread the word, they were able to engage MPs, Peers, Councillors, other schools and community groups in their cause. Anne-Marie Morris MP raised their issue in a debate in UK Parliament and they even received a letter of support from Sir David Attenborough! They are now lobbying leaders to facilitate a Student Climate Conference in the future.

Teacher of the Year – Recognises teachers or educational leaders who have taught their students and colleagues about the UK Parliament in innovative, inspiring and engaging ways.

Vicky Brown is a teacher in Redhill Preparatory School and a UK Parliament Teacher Ambassador. She is keen to prove to children that their opinion matters. She wants them to understand the democratic process and feel empowered to speak up against injustice and fight for what they believe in.

Vicky actively engaged students in a campaign to protect service animals, known as Finn’s Law. Their work was recognised by their MP Stephen Crabb, the Welsh Parliament and Lord German OBE in the House of Lords. When Finn’s Law was passed, they were presented with a copy of the Bill and won an award from the PDSA for their work.

Vicky is keen to dispel the stigma surrounding politics. To achieve this, she delivered training on UK Parliament to staff and a Ted Talk on teaching politics to young children. For children ages 4-11, Vicky created ‘Parliament Month’ in school to explore politics in an age appropriate way.

Through her work the children in the school are passionate about politics and believe that their voice can be heard at the highest level.

UKPW Activity of the year – Recognises the work of those who made an outstanding contribution to UK Parliament Week.

Kelford Special School is an all age school (age 2 to 19) for those with severe and complex needs. The school is passionate about providing the best quality of education and care for all their pupils.

The aim of their UK Parliament Week plan was to engage the whole school in activities promoting democracy and the work of UK Parliament. Teachers were trained to deliver parliamentary and democratic learning through planning cross-curricular activities. Activities included counting votes in maths, writing manifestos in literacy, and learning about the Gunpowder Plot and Suffragette movement in history.

To develop the students’ understanding of how they could have their voice heard, activities each day in that week was chosen through petitions and votes. They also restructured the existing school council to a ‘Pupil Parliament’ to mirror the UK Parliament; elected students were MPs representing class constituents and students with previous school council experience were made Lords.

Winners of the Your UK Parliament Awards 2020 are as follows:

• Volunteer of the Year: Special Needs Jungle
• Digital Campaign or Campaigner of the Year: Operation Black Vote (OBV)
• School of the Year: Torquay Girls’ Grammar School
• Teacher of the Year: Vicky Brown, Redhill Preparatory School
• Community Campaign of the Year: Speak Out
• UKPW Activity of the Year: Kelford Special School
• Campaign or Activity of the Year (in Welsh language): Bangor University Students’ Union
• UKPW Official Partner: Hindu Swayamsevak Sangh UK
• British Youth Council Paul Boskett Memorial Award: Cormac Savage, MYP from South Down and Lylian Nunoo, MYP for East Sussex  

Further detail on the awards can be found here.