Citizens Essex

During the summer term Westcliff High School for Girls, The Westborough Primary School, Prince Avenue Academy and Nursery School and Heycroft Primary School joined Citizens Essex, a group that galvanises organisations to collaborate in order to realise real change in local areas. Our schools will be working with a range of other schools and colleges from across Essex as well as representatives from religious groups, housing, food banks and the charity sector.

This year we have two key events:

A Youth Assembly, held at UPS College on 15th October 2025, which aims to motivate and inspire pupil groups to conduct large-scale listening within their own community so they can really understand what improvements are needed. WHSG pupil representatives will be presenting an update on their listening strategy.

A Mayoral Assembly, hopefully to be held at Chelmsford Cathedral on 24th March 2026, which will bring together all the above mentioned groups so they can share their findings from their community listening and question the Essex Mayoral candidates about their policies in relation to issues raised. This will be a great opportunity for SEEAT pupils to have a string voice in a key democratic process and one we hope will inspire them to continue to campaign for positive change.

For more info:

Some inspiring examples here: Join us as a school - Citizens UK and an example from pupils at St Anthony’s School in Newham who have found their voice to fight for justice for care workers and on housing issues in recent years: ANOTHER ROUND OF APPLAUSE