Student Agency Leadership
Year-Long Play Leadership, Owned by Students
A full-year initiative empowering primary and secondary student leaders to facilitate play across their school community. We train them, coach them and stay with you the whole year.
From selection to standing ovation in 12 months.
Every Student Agency cohort follows the same arc, paced across the school year, with live coaching at every stage.
Launch
Half-day or full-day workshop with the student leadership team. The energy is set, the vision is shared, the cohort is ready.
Plan
Student leadership team moves into planning mode, preparing themselves to deliver their first play-based workshop to the school community.
Lead
Student Leaders facilitate their workshops in small teams. The first of many to come. How exciting!
Reflect
After each workshop student leaders regroup, reflect and plan again, ready to tackle their next workshop. Over time, multiple exposures to facilitating workshops greatly improves their leadership skills and confidence.
Showcase
Let's wrap the year up by showcasing the development of the student leaders: parent sessions and a kick-arse staff workshop all delivered by the student leadership team.
A year of play. Validated by La Trobe.
A 12-month independent study tracked the impact of our play-based programs across primary and secondary schools. Third-party analysis. No editorial influence. Four validated outcomes your principal can put in a report.
The kind of student culture every leader wants.
Student Agency Leadership stays a separate, dedicated program because the year-long format and ongoing coaching cannot be replicated in a workshop. We invest in your cohort the way you invest in your school.
Talk to us about your yearA team of student leaders facilitating play every week
Stronger student voice and agency across the school
Lower playground incidents, higher connection
A reusable program that runs again next year
A year in the life of a Student Agency cohort.
At Kingsley Park Primary School in Melbourne, a student leadership cohort started Term 1 nervous and unsure. By the end of the year they were running workshops for the whole school community and the sense of connectedness had improved greatly across the school.
Playground incidents dropped. Student voice grew. The cohort that came out of it now mentors the next generation of student leaders, and the program runs itself.
Stories from across the play movement.
Deputy headteachers, PE leads and principals share what changed after a year of Student Agency Leadership.
“By the end of the year our Grade 6 leaders were running play sessions for the whole school. The younger students look up to them in a way they never did before.”
Principal, Ocean Grove Primary School
“Our Year 7–10 student leaders grew in confidence beyond what we expected. The impact on school culture was immediate and measurable.”
Wellbeing Lead, Fountain Gate Secondary College
Built different to traditional student leadership programs.
Most student leadership programs are a badge, a meeting and the occasional speech. Student Agency is a year-long initiative with real coaching and real results.
What you get
The School of Play
- Year-long program with termly workshops
- Live coaching across the year
- Real facilitation responsibility
- Weekly play sessions
- Built around a research-validated framework
- Built on the PEGG framework: Play, Exercise, Gratitude, Giving
- Includes both primary and secondary tracks
- End-of-year measurable impact
- Repeatable each year, with mentoring
Traditional student leadership
- One-off badge ceremony
- No ongoing support
- Speeches but no real stakes
- No consistent weekly practice
- No measurement framework
- Usually secondary only
- No end-of-year data
- Starts from scratch every year
Quick answers for school leaders.
Can't find what you're looking for? Drop us a line and we'll get back to you within one business day.
Real answers, real humans.
No bots, no run-arounds.
01How big is the student cohort?
Typically 8–20 students per cohort. Smaller schools run one cohort across both primary and secondary; larger schools run separate primary and secondary cohorts.
02How much teacher time does it require?
One coordinator (a teacher you nominate) does about 1 hour a week. We do the heavy lifting, workshops, coaching calls, materials, end-of-year celebration.
03How are students selected?
We don't prescribe, your school knows your students best. Some schools open it to applications, some appoint, some run a quiet observation. We provide the selection guide.
04How does this differ from Next Gen?
Next Gen is a one-off workshop, powerful, fast, finished in a day. Student Agency is a year-long initiative with ongoing coaching, termly workshops and a cohort that builds over months.
05Can the cohort scale to next year?
Yes, and most schools run it as a recurring annual program. Each year's cohort mentors the next. That's how the school culture compounds.
06What does it cost?
Starting from $4,000 for the full year: workshop, platform access, live coaching, termly sessions, end-of-year showcase and ongoing support all included. The final investment scales with cohort size and school context. Book a discovery call and we'll send a full proposal within one business day.
Students don't just participate. They lead.
This isn't a program done to students. It's one built by them. Student leaders take genuine ownership of their school's wellbeing culture, not as a role, but as a responsibility they're proud to carry.
Student leaders don't run compliance programs. They design and deliver experiences that make the whole school genuinely want to show up and play.
Loneliness and disconnection are the real wellbeing crisis. Student Agency puts student leaders at the centre of building meaningful relationships across every year level.
When students are trusted with real responsibility, they rise to it. By year's end they aren't just leaders in title. They're the heartbeat of the school's wellbeing.
Wellbeing programs often sit outside the school day. Student Agency embeds it into the culture, driven by student leaders who genuinely believe in fun, connection and joy as the foundations of a great school.
One investment. A program that runs every year.
Student Agency is scoped around your school: cohort size, number of campuses and context all shape the final investment.
Everything you need for a full year. No hidden extras.
“We're putting students in charge of our wellbeing culture, not as a token gesture, but with real training, real coaching and real responsibility. By the end of the year we'll have measurable outcomes: improved connectedness, reduced playground incidents and a student leadership team that runs play across the whole school every single week.”
Copy this. Paste it. Win the room.
Most schools find the program pays for itself in the culture shift alone: more connection, less conflict, and a student leadership team that genuinely cares about every person in the building.
Take it away. Share it with your team.
Download the full Student Agency Leadership program booklet: the complete picture of the year-long program, the five phases, the La Trobe research outcomes and the compounding investment model. Print it, share it, bring it to the budget meeting.
PDF · 1.9 MB · Free · No sign-up required
A year that changes a school
Bring Student Agency Leadership to your students. Every cohort, every school is different. We will design your year together, then deliver it with you.