Leadership at the Girls' College

The Girls' College provides many opportunities to our girls for leadership development, in keeping with our servant leadership philosophy. We encourage each and every girl to take up the role of leadership in the school.

We have 15 different committees, all led by the Chairs and Deputy Chairs and with the assistance of a staff member. Each girl in the school is a member of one of the vertical committees and will serve in her area of choice.

Head Girl: Chair of the School Leadership Council

Deputy Head Girl: Chair of the Student Representative Council

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Vertical Leadership Committees:

• Community Engagement: promotion and organisation of community service projects and initiatives.
• Cultural: promotion and organisation of arts and culture events.
• Environmental: maintaining our status as a Green Flag school.
• Houses: House Chairs and deputy chair  look after all matters relating to the house system.
• Jabulani: promotes school spirit and makes school a fun place for the Saints sisterhood.
• Public Relations: raising the profile of the school and serving at events.
• Round Square: responsible for all matters relating to exchanges, adventure and environment at the school.
• Spiritual: serving in the chapel and maintaining the Methodist ethos while building spirituality in the school.
• Sports: promotion and organisation of sporting events.
• Transformation: serving to raise awareness around race, gender, sexuality and other transformation issues.
• This year, we have one new committee, MeLT, which will give our tech savvy girls a place to put their expertise into action. The girls have also restarted the Peer Mentoring Committee. They will help with academic tutoring and keeping the student drive up to date.

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The Chair and Deputy Chairs of these committees for 2018 are:

CAMBOURNE

Diana Kantor & Shaylin Durkin

COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT

Nadine Acheampong & Tyla van Ryswyck

CULTURAL

Botlhale Boikanyo & Tayla Marsh

ENVIRONMENTAL

Jodi Carr & Stephanie Viljoen

JABULANI

Lerato Moshodi & Sanda Nyoka

KENWYN

Kathryn Humphrey & Jessica Groves

MeLT

Tayla Arnoldi

PEER MENTORING

Caroline Mack & Hayley Fawcett

PUBLIC RELATIONS

Zabanguni Phakathi & Noor Albarudi

ROUND SQUARE

Tatum van Heerden & Chante du Preez

SPIRITUALITY

Jade Miller & Kamogelo Molapisi

SPORTS

Alexia Galatis & Kate Pringle

STRATTON

Taryn Lahoud & Natasha Finger

TRANSFORMATION

Sena Letsie & Mondu Shange

TREWEN

Kirsten Nolan & Kayla Strathern

 

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Girls also have the opportunity to serve the school through leadership on the SRC (Students Representative Council), with a representative from every grade. This committee is led by the Deputy Head Girl.

SRC 2018

Grade 8 

Bupe Mucheka & Vartika Pillay

Grade 9

Lelethu Hala & Jenna Lightfoot

Grade 10

Zanele Nzau & Hillary Wanjohi

One girl serves on the Old Stithian Association, this representation extends beyond school, as they represent their year on the OSA once they have left the College. 

Tyla Barker

We try as a Round Square school, to develop democracy and to be faithful to the principles of servant leadership that begin from entry into Saints.

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The Leadership Election Process

Head Girl and Deputy Head Girl

The Grade 11 girls are invited to apply for the role of head/deputy head girl.
They submit a formal written application (candidate profile), which details their contribution to, and participation in, all areas of school life, including academics, sports and cultural activities, community service, other school interests and outside interests. The purpose of the candidate profiles is to give the school body the opportunity to familiarise themselves with all of the candidates, particularly those they do not know personally. This enables them to make a more informed choice.
The candidate profiles are displayed for one to two weeks, on notice boards.
The Grade 10 girls are then tasked with the running of the election process. The Grade 10s elect an Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) which then takes responsibility for the election process. With the assistance of a member of staff, they set up the polling stations, draw up the ballot sheets, ballot boxes and they run the voting process. This is a wonderful way for the Grade 10s to learn about the election process and it also provides them with the opportunity to develop their own leadership skills through service.
The votes are weighted appropriately and then counted by a team led by the Leadership Director, other members of staff and a pupil representative.
The candidate with the highest number of votes is elected head girl, while the candidate with the second highest number of votes is elected deputy head girl.

Vertical Committee Chairs and SRC

In keeping with our principle of encouraging all Grade 12 girls to be leaders, the girls select a leadership committee on which they would like to serve (see Leadership Opportunities above).

All Grade 11 girls are invited to apply for the role of Chair of their chosen leadership committees. Before elections take place, each girl must decide on which committee she wishes to serve. A ballot form is drawn up with the names of all the girls in their various committees. The members of the vertical committee and staff then vote for a Chair in each of the committees.
All girls in the various grades vote for their SRC reps.
The elections for committee positions and SRC are run in exactly the same way as the elections for head girl.
All of the Grade 11 girls will serve the school on a leadership committee in their Grade 11 and matric year.

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As can be seen from the above, we try as a Round Square school, to develop democracy and to be faithful to the four principles of servant leadership that begin from entry into Saints.

• Everyone is a leader – we encourage opportunities to lead from the front, from the side and from behind.
• Leadership is about knowing your BEST SELF – you will lead in front from the area of your strength.
• Leadership can only occur in COMMUNITY.
• Leadership is essentially about SERVICE.

Every girl is expected to lead and to role model leadership to the younger grades, just as the teacher/tutor mentors her/his students.  Leadership is an ongoing journey.  As leadership is developed, we encourage our girls to follow Andy Cope’s BIG 5 in leadership:

• Choose to be positive
• Know your own impact
• Develop bounce-back-ability (Resilience)
• Take personal responsibility
• Set HUGS (Huge, unbelievably great goals)

Our girls are reminded to grow their Seriti (to cast a shadow and leave a legacy and to treat others with dignity); to live the 6Cs and to uphold our top line values. It’s a lot to ask but we know that our girls have so much to give.