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A shared understanding

is the act of students sharing their individual and collective lived experiences, expressed through views and perspectives, demonstrated by formal and informal conversation, debate, feedback, and ultimately, active listening and being heard.

…is a process by which students and staff seek to work together to shape decision-making in higher education, building individual and collective capacity and knowledge to navigate institutional structures and cultures.

…is the practice that both drives forward and emerges from meaningful student engagement, which recognises the need to re-balance power dynamics in higher education and seeks to enable a culture of change through collaboration, reciprocity and shared responsibility between staff and students.

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The student engagement ‘debate’

Engagement in/with learning versus engagement in decision-making
There are a number of approaches to the term ‘student engagement’ and/or partnership across international scholarship
Terms are ‘disparate’ (Bryson, 2014)
Use of terms ‘engagement’ or ‘engages students’ often unsubstantiated in literature with no concept of how that engagement is occurring or viewed

‘we could define student engagement in any way we want’ �(Finn and Zimmer, 2012)

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Partnerships in learning?

The Healy et al (2014) framework has many of the ingredients of partnership and engagement (it is rooted in T&L enhancement)
These approaches are closely aligned with the encouragement of engagement in and with learning
Balance between partnerships in learning with partnership to enhance the learning environment.
Grounded in the idea of partnership in the learning community.
Lessons for all aspects of HE function.

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Partnership and Self-Efficacy

Students as partners in pedagogy is a ‘counternarrative that challenge[s] traditional and neoliberal views, creating space for relational narratives about learning, teaching, and higher education’ (Matthews, Dwyer, Hines, & Turner, 2018)
Cook-Sather and Felten (2017) assert that partnership is enacted within ‘an ethic of reciprocity’ - a ‘process of balanced give-and-take not of commodities but rather of contributions: perspectives, insights, forms of participation.’
‘By developing students’ agency and empowerment through student–staff partnerships, students can actively shape their own educational experiences’ (Abbot 2017)

Dialogue
Building Trust
Equity and Inclusivity
Empowerment
Students as Co-Creators

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Thinking about Bandura…

Mastery (Performance Outcomes)

Developing a sense of ‘expertise’ within the learning community
Knowledge sharing (breaking down knowledge barriers) and being open to change as a result

Vicarious (Social Role Models)

Both staff and students (peers)
Re-balancing perceptions of ‘who’ the decision-makers are

Social Persuasion

Encouraging participation
Supporting individual choices and perspectives

Emotional and Physiological

Building self-esteem and self-belief
Recognising contributions

Imaginal experience (Maddux, 2013)

Demonstrating that contributions can lead to change (and that this is valued and supported)

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Call to action!

If self-efficacy emerges from a sense of belonging to a learning community, then students need to be decision-makers within that learning community.
Think beyond engagement in/with learning…
The traditional decision-makers need to make space for students (who are the decision-makers?)
If we are committed to developing student self-efficacy, then we need to value their contributions.

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