Come January there will be a student at the table during meetings of the Oak Park and River Forest High School District 200 Board of Education after the board unanimously approved a pilot project to include student delegates.
While there will be eight student delegates in all, two from each class, only one student, a senior, will sit at the board table during meetings. That student will be able to participate in board discussions but will not, as is required by state law, have a vote. Students will also not participate in closed sessions of the school board and not have access to closed session materials.
The OPRF School Board has been investigating adding student representatives for months and decided to take the plunge.
“I’m fully in support of this,” said Fred Arkin, board vice-president, before the vote. “I think it’s a long time coming.”
After the meeting, Arkin said he believes both the student delegates and the board will benefit from having student representation.
“It’s an opportunity for them to engage with us and for us to engage with them,” Arkin said.
After the end of the 2025-26 school year, the School Board will determine whether to keep or modify the student representation on the school board.
The student delegates — two freshmen, two sophomores, two juniors and two seniors — will be chosen by a committee consisting of two School Board members, the Student Council sponsors, and members of the OPRF administrative team. The committee will screen applicants and interview finalists.
The two seniors chosen will alternate months sitting at the board table. The student sitting at the board table will participate in discussions while the other student delegates will sit in the audience and observe.
Two School Board members will be liaisons to the student delegates and attend monthly meetings of the OPRF Student Council.
Tom Cofsky, president of the School Board, is ready to welcome the student delegates.
“This is really a chance to get students involved in governance and exposure and I think we probably wouldn’t have prepared for that a few years ago,” Cofsky said. “We kind of had to get our own ship in order.”
Board member Mary Anne Mohanraj credited former board member Gina Harris for pushing the idea of student representation on the school board.
A number of other suburban high school districts already have student representation on their boards, including Lyons Township High School District 204, Riverside Brookfield High School District High School 208 and Downers Grove High School District 99, among others.
However OPRF seems unique in the number of student delegates.
“We’re not just looking to get just one student at the table; we are looking to get something that is integrated to our existing student governance structure,” said District 200 Superintendent Greg Johnson.
The input of student representatives to school boards varies. Sometimes they merely provide a morning announcements style review of happenings at the school while at other times they weigh in on substantive discussions and give board members a glimpse of how policies set by the board are affecting students.
Arkin said the board is looking for input on school governance, not on administrative matters that the board delves into.
“There are some great subtleties in the difference between board work and administrative work and so we’re not looking for students to come here and tell us that we need more pepperoni pizza in the lunchroom,” Arkin said. “We’re expecting them to engage in board level work.”
Students will be excused from any meeting that goes on past 10:00 p.m.
Bob Skoilnik is a freelance reporter for Pioneer Press.
