Student Council opens the suggestion box to hear students’ voices

Recently, Student Council has taken major steps to further improve the school quality and uplift the atmosphere within the student body. Following the “positivity wall” that was creatively decorated with colorful post-its full of SMIC-I students’ voices and enthusiastic attitudes, Student Council has also set up a suggestion box to let the students help contribute toward improving the school. “The suggestion box was our idea for students to write their suggestions to make better changes to the quality of SMIC-I because we realized that the students themselves would probably have the best ideas,” stated Michael Lee (12C), Student Council President. In the previous years, Student Council has had the virtual suggestions survey on their official WeChat account, however, not many helpful suggestions were made. He further added that “This year, we thought having a physical box would help, and it did. We get around 30 each week, and we have a committee that goes through the box that picks which ones are feasible and unfeasible.” In the past few weeks, numerous helpful suggestions from the students were made such as locker shop snack recommendations and other facility related ideas such as air conditioning in all areas of the school.
Students had positive things to say about the new suggestion box. “It is nice that they want to accept feedback from the students, adopting a more democratic way,” Marilyn Ben (11B) stated. She then commented saing, “One change the school should make are the cafeteria meals; it’s more expensive than before. It discourages me from eating there, even if the food is good.”
Other students have anonymously suggested that the school should look more into the heating systems as the frigid winter season negatively affects their health and disrupts their studies. Another quipped that all school bathrooms should have disposable toilet seat covers to help ensure no bacteria or germs are spread while in use.
So far, introducing the suggestion box had been an effective method in helping improve the school, as Student Council listen to students’ concerns and takes action to fulfill their needs.

featured image- Student Council sets the suggestion box to allow students to provide suggestions to  improve the school.  Photo Courtesy of Tomoko Hasegawa

by Tomoko Hasegawa