I’ve just spent a bit over an hour at a secondary school in my ward having a conversation with one of their Year 11 Talented and Gifted groups. It sounded rather daunting, but I think it went very well. Some of the group were a bit quiet, some of them quite outspoken, but they were all very well behaved, and had loads of helpful and sensible things to say and ask.

I’d gone in with a few things prepared in my mind to talk about, all on the “what councils and councillors do” type of thing, so I could have had “what I’ve done this week” (Full Council, residents’ meeting, group meeting, work activities, casework), “what does the council do”, “what say do politicians have in my school”, “what sort of things do neighbours of the school write to me about”.

But in the end, the conversation seemed to me to flow pretty well, and took in a huge amount of Council service areas, and I surprised myself with how much I already knew the answer to. We spent a disproportionate amount of time on rubbish, recycling and collection, possibly because I’ve just started turning up at a Waste Steering Group looking at the future of waste disposal, so it’s at the top of my mind.
There are one or two topics the pupils have asked me to raise in the Council, which I will, and their teacher asked me if he could give my details out to other teachers running similar groups at the school. I’d be more than happy to go back.

When I first started out as a councillor, three and half years ago, I wondered about writing to all the schools in my ward to say, I’m here, I wouldn’t mind visiting if you think I can help out in any way. I didn’t in the end, because that sounded hopelessly self-involved. “*Jazz hands* Here I am!” Maybe I will if and when I get re-elected.

The other thing in the back of my head, as one of my “what-if” plans has been, knowing that I don’t intend to do the politics thing for the rest of my life, I could go back to uni and do a PGCE.  But all I know about schools is what I remember from being there myself.  They’ve changed a lot in the last thirteen years.  The classroom I was in today had a pen-board marked up with WILF WALT boxes for the start of each lesson: What I’m Looking For and We Are Learning Today.  My teachers were good, but I’m not sure they were always so organised!