Talking with the Gymnasium Student Council President, Milos Milovanovic, we got some information about the work and plans of the Council, its cooperation with the administration and much more…

Why did you join the Student Council?

I joined the Student Council because I wanted to help with the work the GSC does and to help develop the role of the student organization in our school, but also in our city. Unfortunately, we don't have the kind of tradition like the United States has where the Student Council is very important factor in making decisions that affect the students. But I hope that we'll achieve that level of democracy soon as well.

What is in your opinion the role of the Student Council?

I think that the Student Council should be a bridge between the school administration and teacher on one side and students on the other side. The Council is there to always protect the students' rights as law defines them, but also to remind the students about their obligations. Our role is also to enrich the extracurricular activities by the promotion of the existing extracurriculars or by founding new ones. Another part of the Council's role is organizing school parties and sport competition and that's our most popular duty.

Do you think that the students who are not directly involved in the GSC's work are well informed about the Council's work?

I wouldn't say they are well informed and both the Student Council and the students are responsible for that. Our fault is not having invested much energy to solve that problem and the students' fault is the lack of interest they showed whenever there was an action with goal to inform the students about the GSC.

What are you going to do to motivate those students?

We have plans about some actions like the sports competitions which always assemble a lot of students and we can use those events as a great opportunity to inform the students about our work.

At what level is the cooperation with other High School student councils in Banja Luka?

We have the cooperation with other student councils in Banja Luka through the Banja Luka Union of High School Students and together we organize events like the High School Students Day. I think that the High School Students Union Members should work more actively in making joint efforts of all the student councils in the city to fight together for our goals because we're stronger when we're united.

 When we're talking about our cooperation about the student organizations in our country and abroad, I'm glad to say that our student have recently returned from a trip to Mostar's Second Gymnasium and our Student Council has the cooperation with theirs. We also have excellent relationships with the Student Council of Kragujevac's Second Gymnasium.

What's the cooperation with the school administration like?

Our cooperation with the administration is satisfactory, though it could be better. When it comes to our cooperation with our teacher-coordinator, the school Counselor, Assistant Principal and the Principal, I can say that it is very well. In the next academic year we're going to make it even better by better informing the administration about our work.

 The cooperation with the teachers is somewhat lesser primarily because the teachers are not well informed about our work, but I hope to fix that soon.

Is it possible that the teachers consider the Student Council to be a threat to their authority?

I don't think so. They have no reason to think so, because the Student Council is not there to be against somebody or for somebody. The Student Council is there to help achieve cooperation between the teachers and students who are the most important in education, thus by helping the students we help improve the quality of the entire education. That's why we should all consolidate in order to make the Council's work more effective and no one should see it as a threat to anything. It is an asset to our education, not a threat.

After the recent GSC elections, what plans and changes can we expect next year?

Well, the major changes came after the new GSC Constitution was adopted by the Council on 29 April. Now we have a different structure and the Student Council is more decentralized because beside President there is a Vice-president for every class (Freshman, Sophomore, Junior and Senior). That puts the emphasis on the Class Council Meetings what gives better results and more material for discussions. I'm sure that this way our work is more efficient.

 Our plans for the next academic year are already being planned. We're going to continue with the old Council activities and add new ones. I think that the Council will agree with me to stop doing the statistics of the students' absences because it showed quite ineffective, but we'd like to work on that problem with the Parents Council and teachers.

I can inform you about some of our activities for the next year. Those are sports competitions in football, basketball, volleyball and athletics; school parties in November and February; performance on the Banja Luka Book Fair '06; visit to the Second Gymnasium Kragujevac; promotion of volunteerism and extracurriculars; humanitarian actions. We also planned revision of the GSC Constitution and Meeting rules. A detailed plan of our activities can be found on our web-site.

Is the GSC going to have cooperation with the NGOs from our city or international organizations?

Yes, but for something like that we need a project. Once the Executive Board and all the Council Members who wish to join us think of a new and creative project, we're going to send the project to City Parliament; Department for sport, youth and family; OSCE and NGOs in order to get the financial support from them.