UNICEF Rights Respecting School

We are now a UNICEF Rights Respecting School Gold: Rights Respecting Award holder

Alexandra aims to be a school where children's rights are at the heart of our ethos and culture. We are always aiming to improve wellbeing and develop every child's talents and personalities, so that they can reach their full potential. We have now been recognised as a 'Rights Respecting School Gold' on behalf of UNICEF (July 2023) - the first school in the borough of Richmond and Kingston to do so.

UNICEF is the world's leading organisation working for children and young people. In 1989, governments across the world signed the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC). These rights are based on children's basic needs and enable them to expand their opportunities and reach their full potential.

Alexandra pupils learn about their rights through interactive lessons and by putting them into practice every day. A Rights Respecting School has these rights embedded in their whole school culture. The School Council acts as the 'Rights Knights' to oversee the development of the UNICEF rights across our school and work together to make Alexandra Primary School an even better place to learn.

On Friday 20th November 2020, on Universal Children's Day, we launched Rights Respecting across the school. Children looked at the CRC (Convention on the Rights of the Child) and completed activities based on these.

To find out more about UNICEF Rights Respecting Schools, please visit their website.

Rights Knights Job Description (created by pupils)

The Rights Knights fosters the wider opinion of all students on the daily running of our school. The council regularly meets with senior leaders and school staff to discuss important issues such as ensuring rights are met across the school, campaigning for the rights of others outside of our school, recycling and the environment and any other issues raised. You will be an important part of the Rights Knights and must be able to represent your classmates.

Main Responsibilities

Represent the Rights Knights at meetings and other events such as MP visits and conferences in the community
Listen to your classmates and share their views at meetings
Contribute to planning for future campaigns
Have a passion for ensuring every child’s rights are met
Be a role model around the school
Attend regular meetings
Participate in assemblies and other meetings which share rights with our community
Attend training events when needed
Support school wide fundraising events
Contribute to the newsletter and school newspaper and update the school community on campaigns and progress with adult support

Personal Skills and Qualities

Leadership, Team Work, Time Management, Organisation, Communication, Resilience

OutRight Campaign

We are part of the OutRight campaign this year. Our Rights Knights voted to support Marcus Rashford’s #EndChildFoodPoverty campaign and decided to focus this year on looking at the right to health.

A few students wrote to the Rights Knights before Christmas and expressed their concern that people in the local area would not have their right to health met as they are homeless or needing to use a food bank. The Rights Knights sprang into action and, with the support of the whole school community, donated lots of food items at Christmas time to our local food bank. This was estimated to have fed over 150 people, ensuring they had nutritious, healthy food.

The Rights Knights took this a step further, and decided to campaign to end child food poverty, giving all children up to 16 and living in poverty free school meals (at the moment, this stops at 11 years old). The Rights Knights took ideas and concerns from their classmates and wrote letters to Sarah Olney (local MP). Sarah Olney was so touched by our campaign, she came to visit us.

Sarah Olney was so impressed with the letters after her visit to the school that she sent these to the Prime Minister, Rishi Sunak. We hope he will support our campaign!