Twice every school year, GUSD’s Student Advisory Council hosts the Student Voice Panels, where each school within the district sends student representatives to discuss select topics. These panels include a moderator, who guides the conversation and ensures everything flows smoothly. The moderator is usually a student from the hosting school. This year’s spring student voice panel took place at Hoover High School on Thursday, February 27, 2025. The event is also typically broadcast live for community members to view from the comfort of their homes.
The discussion questions focus on school improvement by discussing issues and successes, and how to apply them. The moderator asks a set of questions, which the panelists can respond to voluntarily. While answering these questions, GUSD Board Members and other district leaders, including the superintendent, take notes and come up with questions and comments for the students in addition to the questions already asked.
This year’s questions were fairly broad but split into three general categories: College and Career Success, Health and Safety, and Student Engagement and Campus Culture. The students provided insight into each school and even spoke about their personal experiences.
“The students across the board did really well. They represented themselves well and were comfortable speaking honestly about their experiences,” Clark principal Mark Rubio said. Clark was represented by Emilio Maldonado, Rhymme Keizelle Rillera, and Aline Melconian. However, two out of the three Glendale representatives were also from Clark but were transfers. Evidently, this led to some back-and-forth between the two schools with disagreements of what the culture and experience for Clark students was, with all respective students providing their own personal experiences.
The event was an overall success leaving district members as well as school administrators with a lot of information directly from student experiences to reflect on and work towards improving. “The Student Voice Panel is an important opportunity for the school-site staff and district staff to hear from students directly about their experience on their campuses so that we can make better decisions about how we run our schools,” Mr. Rubio said. Though not everyone is selected for the panel, it is equally important to hear the individual voices of other students because everyone provides a unique perspective.
