PUPILS played a special part in the hiring of a school’s new deputy and assistant headteacher.

When Richmond CE Primary School decided to hire a new assistant and deputy head, to join executive head Maxine Price, the school decided to make the process as democratic as possible. During the interview, members of the junior leadership team were allowed to also question the candidates.

Executive head Maxine Price said it helped children understand the process in appointing people to run the school and for their voice to be heard. She said: “We recently rekindled our pupil voice and have created a junior leadership team to join the senior leadership team, which is the teachers.

“They were such an instrumental part of the interview process for our new head and deputy head.

“It was the most rigorous part of the interview process. A lot of their questions were based around, ‘What sort of teacher are you? Why do you want to work in our school? What do you like about teaching? And even ‘Do you like children?’”

The children were required to ask the same questions of each of the five candidates and then contributed a score system.

The new appointments were Lucy Hodges, an existing teacher in the school who has been promoted to deputy, and Catherine Millar, who was appointed assistant head.

Catherine Millar said: “They asked very vigorous questions; one question was “what do boundaries mean to you?” The caring ethos of the school really shone through the whole interview process.”

A celebratory afternoon tea was held for the junior leadership council and the new teachers with non-alcoholic champagne and buns and cakes.