Be a Good Prefect
Becoming a prefect is a great way to end time at your school, and is a massive advantage for you in the future. Research shows that many successful business people held positions of responsibility while they were at school, and school prefect looks great on anyone's CV. So if you were one of the lucky ones, congratulations!
Contents
Steps
- Maintain discipline. Prefects have advantages over teachers in that the younger children look up to them, as a result keeping the rules is a much easier job for Prefects than it is for teachers.
- Help staff. Prefect is one of the top roles a student can have at a school. You are now working with the teachers to create a better place to learn, and a mature, helpful prefect is sure to be trusted.
- Support younger pupils. The knowledge that there are Prefects willing to help will be very reassuring to newer pupils, and they will count on you to live up to their expectations and as someone who can help guide them through their school life.
- Be approachable. The kind and friendly prefect will gain the most respect. Offering help to those that might need it is better than waiting to be asked, and more often than not your offers will be taken up appreciatively.
- Be involved. Prefects are given a lot of responsibility in the form of organizing and running events for parents and pupils of the school. It raises your prefect profile and impresses teaching staff, and also puts you in good stead for the future. Colleges and employers are keen to see examples of people that have been involved in voluntary school activities.
- Practice good communication skills. The key is to be approachable, whether it is to students, parents, or visitors. The steps above require communication to be clear and confident.
- A confident prefect sometimes needs to be something you learn how to become. Meeting with fellow prefects, teachers, visitors and parents and making presentations can help build up your confidence within school. Observe how they react to you, and change your communication skills accordingly to become the best prefect you can be.
- Enjoy it! Many new students are very impressionable, and meeting a confident, helpful prefect can be something they will remember when they apply for the position in years to come.
Tips
- Speak to other Prefects in local schools to see what they are doing and if you can learn from them.
- Prefects are also there to guide you if you may not be sure of something you may ask any prefect. Than to ask your teacher being a prefect is an absolutely enjoyable role as a role model to smaller children. Prefects help teachers a lot by applying discipline to the smaller children.
Warnings
- Remember to be just as friendly to your fellow prefects. You're all working towards helping the same school and students within it, and with good communication between prefects your job can be made a lot easier.
- Don't use it as an opportunity to intimidate other students and don't be a bully. Being a prefect doesn't make being a bully justifiable. A prefect can be reported to the school just as a bully can, and any prefect who abuses their status is likely to be removed from the team as well as punished as a regular student would be, at best. At worst, punishments can be worse considering that they are trusted with more responsibilities than regular students i.e. supervising libraries and lunch rooms possibly in lieu of teachers as part of their duty.
- If a duty or role assigned to you is too much or not convenient, it is much better to talk about it with your head of year than simply not do your duty.
- Know when to stop helping. If there is an issue you're not sure whether you should resolve, ask a teacher.
- If you are seen breaking or not enforcing the rules, you won't be sending out the right message, and are in danger of losing your prefect status. Make sure that even if you aren't enforcing the rules, you're abiding by them.
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