SCC
School Community Councils
The purpose of School Community Councils (SCC) is to strengthen the shared responsibility for learning success and wellbeing of all children and youth. And as well to encourage and facilitate parent and community engagement in school planning and improvement processes.
Meeting Basics
SCCs must hold a minimum of five meetings per school year. Plan your schedule of meetings at the first
meeting of each school year.
Agendas keep meetings on track:
- Discuss items for the next meeting at the end of each meeting to get ideas from all.
- Two weeks before your meeting, prepare the agenda and email it to the principal to review. Send the final agenda to participants and post it on the school website a week or so before the meeting.
- Use a consistent agenda structure. For each item, indicate the purpose (Decision, Discussion/Brainstorming orInformation).
- If possible, e-mail written reports ahead of time so members can do some pre-meeting homework, prepare questions and become familiar with the information.
- Review the agenda at the start of each meeting so that participants know what to expect.
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The role of the Chair is to “control traffic” during the meeting and keep the meeting on schedule. Effective practices include:
- Ensuring all points of view are expressed and encouraging participation from all.
- Setting a tone of collegiality, respect and inclusiveness.
- Always starting meetings on time.
- Always ending meetings on time. If you are running behind, ask attendees to help you keep track of the time or ask the group for ideas to manage within the remaining time.
- Using a “parking lot” for issues that come up but are not on the agenda or cannot be dealt with quickly.
Agree to ground rules in advance, such as: be respectful and include everyone; stay focused; reach closure; always honour confidentiality.
- Include your ground rules on each agenda and review them with new attendees.
- Post a copy of your SCC constitution on the school website for each reference in case a question comes up during a meeting.