15 May 2015

As UK residents went to the polls last week students at Chilton Cantelo School also exercised their democratic rights in a mock election.

A number of Year 7 and Year 8 students identified their party of choice before going on to produce leaflets and posters which were then displayed around the school.

Under the supervision of History teacher and head of the Chilton Cantelo Debating Society, Mr Paterson, they then organised the election itself, designing ballot papers, attending the polling station and ensuring everyone who wanted got a chance to vote.

In addition to this, a number of students throughout the school took the survey on the website, voteforpolicies.co.uk, where participants were asked to choose from a range of policies before learning the party those policies were identified with. This provided a far greater range of results with all five major parties gaining a substantial proportion of support.

The results were: Conservatives (38%), UKIP (27%), Green (16%), Lib Dem (12%), Labour (5%).

It wasn’t a direct reflection of what happened in the general election, but the Conservatives coming on top was certainly prophetic.

Mr Paterson said: ‘It is really important that young people engage with the world around them, and the work done by this small group of students has benefited the whole school. For that, they should receive the thanks of all.’