Trust Parliament Trustee Meeting – 7th July 2025.
This academic year, we have created a Trust Parliament which is made up of two children from each of our schools within our Trust. When the Trust Parliament began, pupils who were interested in joining, had to put themselves forward and give a presentation to year 6. Within their presentation, they had to detail why they wanted to join and why they thought they’d be good at the role. Two representatives were then elected from each school.
For their first in-person meeting, the Trust Parliament met at the Crofty Trust offices where they listened to a presentation from Mr Hague about democracy. As a group, they brainstormed ideas about how a Trust Parliament can help our schools. There were many ideas, such as each school having a school pet, non-uniform Fridays, developing a Crofty choir and working together to support a local charity. Eventually, all pupils within our schools would have an opportunity to vote on which change they would like to happen.
We held a whole Trust Teams meeting online to discuss the voting process, this was a very successful meeting where over 90 classes joined to listen! The pupils learned how to fill out their ballot paper and how not to ‘spoil’ their paper. We then declared the vote officially open!
Official ballot boxes were delivered to the schools, voting stations were created and every child in the Trust had an opportunity to cast their vote. The following day, the ballot boxes were collected and delivered to the Crofty office in Tolvaddon where some of the Trust Parliament came together to count the votes. We had a special visit from one of our local MP’s, Perran Moon, who helped us.
The results:
- 2122 votes to support a charity across the Trust
- 695 votes to form a Crofty Choir
- 67 Spoilt votes
We decided to support a local charity, it was very difficult, but we managed to narrow it down to three charities which were Penhaligon’s Friends, Cornwall Air Ambulance and SPACE Programme. These options were shared with the Trust Parliament members and each class in the Trust had a vote.
The winning charity was Penhaligon’s Friends. This is a Cornish charity supporting bereaved children, young people, parents, and carers throughout the county. They offer children and young people the chance to meet others and share their experiences, as well as practical resources to help them cope with their grief. Penhaligon’s Friends provide support whether the person died very recently or a long time ago and their services are provided at no cost to families in support of children and young people who live in Cornwall. In the 2023/24 year, the charity supported 1012 children and young people.
Today, some members of the Trust Parliament met with the Trustees at one of their official meetings to ask for their support in making this an official Crofty ‘Law’.
We are excited to announce that it was a unanimous vote, and all the Trustees agreed that from September, Penhaligon’s Friends will be the local charity that all our schools will support. In September, the Trust Parliament will get together to come up with some fun ideas to support the schools with fundraising.
Thanks to everyone who has taken part and help the Trust Parliament, it has been very successful, and we look forward to starting our fundraising next year!