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The purpose of this narrative inquiry is to better understand why students in higher education are motivated to get involved in student government. We analyzed the responses of ten current student government leaders at public regional comprehensive institutions in the United States. The analysis is guided by Astin's theory of student involvement and the social change model of leadership development. The study finds that many leaders did not initially plan to engage in student government, emphasizing the impact of past civic involvement, current student engagement, and peer invitations on their subsequent student government participation. Implications call for institutions to deepen their understanding of enrolled students and provide accessible avenues for leadership development.

This piece is presented from ongoing empirical research exploring barriers to student (re)engagement at a Midwestern university as COVID-19 persists. While college student personnel have worked to restore student life as campus operations have transitioned back in-person, college student engagement has struggled at many institutions across the United States. Taking a qualitative, phenomenological approach - with transformative leadership as a theoretical framework - this study revealed virtual exhaustion, student voice exclusion, and competing priorities as barriers to re-engaging with campus activities. This piece concludes with transformative advising as a possible approach for college student personnel to address these barriers alongside students.

Student governments can play an important part of the habit development of participating in democracy. A study in 2012, however, illustrated just how few students actually voted in their own student government elections. With a changing world of national politics, there is a need to understand student voting as a possible reflection of participation after college. This study compared student voting in their own government elections between 2012 and 2020, finding several, yet no significant, differences in voter turnout. The study used a sample of doctoral and comprehensive institutions, finding under one-in-five students voted in their own government elections.

In this critical discourse analysis, we examined 18 college student government campaign platforms from 9 institutions in the state of Florida. We used neoliberalism as a conceptual framework to examine platforms and, in particular, the way(s) students running for office described neoliberal agendas, policies, and thought. Findings revealed concern for student finances and increasing student fees, proposed private sector solutions, an unacknowledged political climate, communications trends, and notable differences by institution type.

Does political ideology affect how students judge situations? Although students who are liberal or conservative might both show political bias, they differ in their views of how the world works. This experiment conducted with 739 students manipulates ideology in a scenario about a student government regulating a biased student newspaper. Results showed symmetry in some but not all items, suggesting that bias may have different causal mechanisms depending on ideology.

Studies show that despite many programs with intentions to create a positive and inclusive learning environment, bullying and exclusion is still a challenge. This article investigates the following: (a) What challenges are there in the psychosocial learning environment in primary school, from a student perspective, and (b) what strategies can students apply to solve these challenges and contribute to creating an inclusive learning environment? The framework for data collection has been a five-step method for mastery, participation, and motivation, based on health-promoting theory and self-determination theory. Student representatives applied the method in their classes through student council work, with support from their teachers. A content analysis of student data identified challenges related to three main categories: relational factors, structural factors, and individual factors. To solve these challenges, the students suggested reward systems and inclusive strategies, such as asking others to join when playing, inviting someone home, and talking to students who are alone. The article concludes that it is important to include students in processes of change, and work systematically and over time to create a good learning environment.

On October 18th, 2019, Chile experienced the beginning of its most powerful social uprising since the return of democracy in 1990. People took to the streets of cities all over the country, protesting against social inequality in terms of healthcare, education, household living conditions, and wages, among other issues. Students, who have been critical actors in several social protests in the past, were the ones that initiated this social outbreak. However, as usual, the participation of vocational education students--a marginalised group in society--is unknown. Through ethnographic fieldwork, it was possible to observe the participation spaces that vocational education students of two lower-class schools on the outskirts of Santiago, Chile had before and during the social uprising. Data shows that the student government was the sole space of participation for students before the social uprising, but it was completely ignored during it. Students created their own protests inside the schools during the social protests, creating spaces to participate and claiming an active role. The importance of educating vocational education students to be active citizens and that of breakthrough marginalisation is discussed.

This study examines the relation between student experiences of participation in a whole school approach (WSA) and students' self-perceived action competence. We surveyed 902 students in three Norwegian upper-secondary schools participating in an education for sustainable development (ESD) programme. The questionnaire measured students' experiences in decision-making and influencing within a WSA, containing the components: (1) school and leadership, (2) teaching and learning, (3) community connections and (4) student council. We measured students' self-perceived action competence through: (1) knowledge of action possibilities, (2) confidence in one's own influence and (3) willingness to act. A structural equation model indicates a positive relation between student participation in ESD teaching and learning and students' knowledge of action possibilities and confidence in their own influence. Participation through the student council positively related to all action competence components. We found no significant relation between participation in school and leadership or community connections on any action competence factors. It is important to note that this cross-sectional study with a limited number of schools does not establish causality, necessitating further research. Nevertheless, the results suggest that promoting student participation in teaching and learning and facilitating a well-functioning student council can promote students' development of action competence for sustainability.

While biographical sketches of many publicly elected leaders in the US exist, little is known about the connection between serving in college student government and running for or serving in elected public office after college. This phenomenological study explored the experiences of 19 former college student government officers in elected, post-college public office. Notably, former college student government officers felt like they were in public office all along and that student government was a microcosm of post-college public life. College campaigns and elections were preparatory experiences, and college student government was a "training ground" for later elected office and representational leadership.

Student leadership is often misconceptualized as merely a pedagogical exercise revolving around simulated political arenas with little to no immediate real political consequence. Other scholarship normalizes students as political outsiders who have to resort to dangerous, exhausting activism tactics for even minute advocacy victories due to their lack of structural representation in education decision-making. An analysis of student leadership in research and practice is presented according to an identified spectrum of low to high student power. This article argues that student leadership has great potential for real political action. The best structure for student leadership is argued to be democratic student government, as well as students having standing roles within education leadership structures. Furthermore, effective conceptions of student leadership must not only acknowledge its developmental aspects, but also account for the real politics inherent in student leadership activities. To conclude, a more political conception of student leadership and student government is advocated for so student leaders' real political activities can be recognized and studied as such in education leadership discourse to prevent student exploitation and tokenism.

College student government is a form of student involvement in higher education, and one that has evolved over time. But student government is not without politics, from legislating on campus to making statements on local, national, and international issues. This article illuminates data from a phenomenological study of nineteen former student government officers who ran for or served in post-college public office (e.g., mayors, city councilmembers, state senators, and more). Two major themes are rendered in this article: "student government and non/partisanship" and "student government and decision-making power." Questions and recommendations are left as a way to better understand college students and student government and serve as a calling to further interrogate this topic and form of student- and political-engagement.

Public higher education institutions in South Africa conduct Student Representative Council (SRC) elections yearly. However, there is a paucity of studies to determine factors that affect voter turnout in these elections. This descriptive quantitative study conducted an empirical analysis of factors influencing students' voter participation at Africa's largest Open Distance eLearning institution. An electronic survey instrument was distributed among the sampled students and yielded a final response count of 6,851. A joint descriptive statistical analysis and binary logistic regression model were applied to analyse the data. Regression analysis revealed that there was a significant relationship between students having encountered one or more of a number of marketing initiatives employed in relation to the elections and voter participation. This positions marketing as a significant predictor of student voting given that respondents who encountered SRC election marketing initiatives were seven times more likely to vote, as shown by the odds ratio (OR=7.9 [95% CI:6.6-9.3], p=0.001). The second-highest predictor of voting in this study was the impact of the closing date for voting. Student respondents who indicated that the voting period was long enough were two times more likely to vote compared with those who did not believe it was long enough (OR=2.2 [95% CI: 1.9-2.7], p-value <0.001). Other significant predictors of SRC voting included gender, employment status and level of qualification. Whereas the study revealed a fair balance between the influence of demographic and systemic factors on SRC electoral process, institutions need to pay close attention to systemic factors, which have great potential to constrain voter participation.

The Fallist movements of 2015/16 brought about rapid change to the South African higher education space, which required student leaders to reconsider their roles as agents of change and transformation. Student leaders contribute as stakeholders of and decision-makers in student governance, and some find themselves in a context where their working and living spaces become increasingly entangled. This is a particularly challenging context, which requires them to conflate their personal and "professional" lives. In this article, we focus on the challenges student leaders face as peer educators in both on- and off-campus residences of the University of the Free State (UFS), Bloemfontein, South Africa. The resilience and vulnerability of student leaders, and how these play out in their experiences at UFS, will be highlighted. The importance of self-reflection, resilience and fragility in professional development will be explored. Guided by the theoretical underpinnings of pedagogy as transformative and humanizing, and a multiple-method-approach that included survey data as well as arts-based methods, we engaged with student leader experiences in order to understand how they negotiated challenges in a space of tranformation and constant change. We found arts-based research to complement and support the more conventional data gathering process. Our article thus highlights how methodological inventiveness can address new and different questions that arise in our rapidly changing pedagogical space. Through this, we highlight the complex micro-social experiences of student leaders who live in spaces of transformation. Student leaders are in a unique position as people who live and work in the student community, and their role as peer educators remains largely unexplored. In this article, we hope to contribute to a body of knowledge that could foreground student leadership in relation to transformed pedagogy.

Many notable leaders in the United States previously served in their college's student government, including Stacey Abrams, Hillary Rodham Clinton, and Elijah Cummings. Findings in this article derive from a larger study on the experiences of former college student government officers who ran for or served in post-college public office between 2018-2021. Themes in this article reflect the experiences of participants who identify as Persons of Color, women, or gay/bisexual, and the nuances of gender, gender and race, race, and sexuality in the context of collegiate and post-college public office. Among others, recommendations for practice include a calling to student government advisors and university administrators to create and offer tools for participants with minoritized identities to successfully access and matriculate through collegiate public office.

The "U.S. News and World Report" has ranked the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV) as being one of the most racially diverse institutions, and UNLV has received dual-designations as an Asian American and Native American Pacific Islander-Serving Institution and Hispanic-Serving Institution. Concurrently, pervasive physical threats, student demands for change, and results of a campus climate survey created a peremptory need to center the cultural wealth of minoritized students to organize and coalition build. This essay focuses on the UNLV Minority-Serving Institution (MSI) Student Council (MSISC) and its charge to lead campus initiatives that promote success for minoritized students to become a truly serving MSI. Written by one of the MSISC members and their advisor, we historicize the MSISC's creation and share ideas for similar MSI-focused student committees and task forces.

Deliberative pedagogy holds promise for improving democratic society by cultivating practical wisdom in students as a means to tackle the problems of democracy, such as polarization. This study embraced an opportunity to consider civic education in the 21st century through deliberative pedagogy by considering practical wisdom in a synchronous, virtual deliberation among university stakeholders and local political candidates concerning our role in 21st-century politics. This civic site enabled an analysis of practical wisdom across three student roles: facilitators enrolled in a deliberation course; students from the wider university; and student alumni of the university's deliberation center, who had been exposed to deliberation in curricular and cocurricular practice. Using a constructive rhetorical analysis to understand practical wisdom within deliberative pedagogy discourse, we contend that students in these three different roles demonstrated three key aspects of practical wisdom through their discursive responses to rhetorical exigences that arose during deliberative engagement. This analysis offers insights beyond outcomes and informs deeper thinking about curricula and better pedagogical practices. Additionally, such studies, focused on the discourse itself, contribute to understandings concerning the connection between rhetoric and deliberative pedagogy.

Student representation and student partnership differ and the difference matters. To further scholarly understanding of, and appreciation for, the important difference between the two, we examine these two commonly evoked conceptions for student voice in higher education. We draw on two points of difference--responsibility and access--to illuminate conceptualisations and discourses of each in the current literature. In doing so, we clarify the unique contributions of each, shaped by differing contexts of interaction, and articulate issues arising by confounding and conflating partnership and representation in the name of student voice. Advancing an argument for an ecosystem of student participation grounded in student voice, we warn of the harm in positioning student partners as speaking for other students and the risk of diminishing the importance of elected student representation systems in favour of staff selected student partner models of student representation.

A student body president's work involves addressing emerging crises and challenging institutional decision-makers to respond to the cost of higher education, campus sexual assault, mental health, free speech, and student safety (Student Voice Index, 2018). This phenomenological study unearths the experiences of individuals who previously served as student body president of their institution's student government and who now work in higher education and student affairs. Three themes emerged as a result of multiple interviews with eight former student body presidents, including having a reserved "seat" at "the table," pre-exposure to a career in higher education and student affairs, and a whiplash-like transition following their term. As a result, implications involve the importance of student elections and attention to a retirement-like experience for former student body presidents.

This article argues that institutions of higher education (IHEs) require a fundamental paradigm shift toward an Indigenous Knowledge (IK) model inclusive of Indigenous Peoples, perspectives, and values. This model acknowledges the sacred value of nature, the rights of non human species, and the power and potential of transformative learning via collaboration with Indigenous communities. Through four personal experiences from one IHE, we highlight challenges and opportunities to decolonize higher education across the domains of policy, research, teaching, and programs. Examples include the Graduate Student Government's resistance to university policies of unsustainable construction projects; incorporating IK from Eastern traditions and world spiritual practices into course curriculum; Indigenizing higher education courses and projects through inclusion and collaboration with local Indigenous tribal members; and finally, ongoing transnational research and education collaborations with an Indigenous Mebêngôkre-Kayapó community in the Brazilian Amazon.

Recent studies on student politics and governance have shown that electoral clientelism (EC) in university student elections is often facilitated by clientelist relations between student leaders and political parties. However, there is a dearth of empirical research investigating the various forms of electoral clientelism, as manifested through vote-buying practices in campus electoral politics in African universities. This article, therefore, investigates the multifaceted and changing dynamics of vote-buying in student electoral processes in Ghanaian universities. The study adopted a qualitative approach based on semi-structured interviews with 15 student leaders, 4 university staff working with student leadership, and 4 focus group interviews involving students at the University of Ghana and Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology. From our finding, we argue that electoral clientelism takes place in five crucial ways in university student elections in Ghana. These include the provision of direct cash payments, exchanging electoral support for student government positions and appointments, provision of food and beverage consumables, award of student-related business contracts, and provision of educational materials and souvenirs.

Every year, class representatives are elected at the University of Cape Town to represent students on academic matters in relation to a specific academic course. A vital element of this representative role is to advocate for an enabling learning environment that promotes learning excellence. In preparing class representatives for their leadership roles, the Department of Student Affairs, in partnership with the Students' Representative Council (SRC) and the Faculty Councils, host and facilitate a class representative induction programme. The induction typically utilised face-to-face synchronous teaching methods. However, since the advent of COVID-19, adaptions to the induction programme had to be made in order to reflect the new normal imposed by the pandemic. Against this backdrop, this article addresses various design-related choices encountered from an online education technology perspective. Key areas of reflection include working with the SRC Undergraduate Academic Co-ordinator and Faculty Councils as a design team in transitioning a, hitherto, synchronous programme catering for approximately 420 class representatives, from a face-to-face mode of delivery to an online mode of delivery. Particular attention is paid to the social constructivist design elements of the programme development process and how these elements were managed with regards to the enablements and constraints encountered in the virtual space by exploring the technological affordances of various ed-tech options available to student affairs practitioners. This article contributes to the practitioner literature by demonstrating how ed-tech can be leveraged to aid in the preservation of existing practices as blended learning approaches continue to shape and augment the future of co-curricular programme delivery in higher education.

Being politically aware and participating in politics are essential determinants of a society's democratic survival. One source of concerns for researchers of political behavior regarding post-apartheid South Africa is the low rates of youth's political participation. There is however a dearth of empirical studies in the extant literature on the university students' political awareness and their political participation in post-apartheid South Africa. This mixed-methods research was conducted to fill in this obvious gap. A study sample of 372 undergraduate students selected from one rural university in the Eastern Cape through the stratified random sampling techniques yielded the quantitative data, and the qualitative data were obtained from five (5) executive members of the Student Representative Council (SRC) who were purposively selected for semi-structured interviews. Both quantitative and qualitative data analyses were performed by employing simple descriptive and Pearson correlation statistics as well as a thematic content analytical approach. Results showed that nearly all the respondents demonstrated a high level of political awareness in terms of rights to vote and be voted for (99.4%), the importance of parliament, and the national constitution (99.1%) while the respondents' levels of political participation appeared to be below average as only (49.2%) voted during the 2017 SRC election, whereas (30.4%) of them voted in the 2014 national elections. Students' political awareness was found to be significantly correlated with their participation in political activities on-campus (r = 0.130) and off-campus (r = 0.185). In conclusion, the bivariate analysis indicated that there was a positive correlation between students' political awareness and their participation in politics (P<0.001).

The upper secondary school for individuals with intellectual disability should prepare for an adult life as an active citizen with great self-determination and participation in democratic decision-making processes. The extent to which and in what way the schools work to prepare the students and develop their skills are likely of great importance for the students' adult life. The purpose of the study was to increase the knowledge of how students with intellectual disability in Sweden are prepared for adulthood, with special focus on self-determination. Case studies on three schools were carried out through observations of decision-making processes and interviews with students and staff. The main findings consist of three different approaches to self-determination for students with intellectual disability: 'Targeted and Conscious', 'Forward with Uncertainty' and 'Braking and Protecting'. Increased knowledge about, and analyses of, the processes that take place when young people with reduced decision-making capacity, due to intellectual disability, make decisions with the support of others are important. Implications underline the need to strengthen the awareness, knowledge and support of school staff when it comes to strengthening students' decision-making capacity. The students with intellectual disability need to be equipped for a society where they as adults will be surrounded by choices and expectations of making decisions.

In a hermeneutic phenomenological study on the lived experiences of openly gay undergraduate men in elected student government (see Goodman, 2021, 2022), one major theme emerged: the men were elected and selected. This study contained multiple conversations with eight openly gay undergraduate men who were elected to their institution's student government. As part of being "elected," the men were "selected" by their peers, as openly gay, and even as "fears and myths about them" existed on their respective campuses. To "dispel" such fears, as Harvey Milk suggested, gay men being (s) elected to undergraduate student government specifically not only adds greatly to society, but also contributes to the queering of student government as a system that was otherwise marginalizing and exclusive. To be active in this way--to be (s)elected--is a queering of the student government space. While gay men alone are not the queering of student government, or elected politics more broadly, they are certainly an ingredient to queering the governance space, on campus and beyond.

This article explores the connection between college student involvement and leadership identity development (LID), focusing specifically on the cocurricular experiences of student clubs and organizations, student government, sororities and fraternities, and student recreation/athletics. Key considerations for focusing on students' LID through student involvement opportunities are included.

Meaningful student participation is essential to realizing democratic ideals within the university. However, existing structures for involving students within university governance suffer from a variety of shortcomings, leaving scholars calling for ways to make student participation more inclusive, effective, and thoughtful. To address this challenge, this article draws on deliberative democracy as both a theoretical framework and a source of practical innovation. In doing so, it explores the ways in which student participation in university government both does, and could, contribute to universities' 'deliberative capacity'--that is, their capacity to host inclusive, authentic, and consequential deliberation on shared issues. By evaluating the most prominent forms of student participation against these democratic ideals, the article offers a deliberative democratic critique of student participation that coheres, builds on, and gives new significance to existing criticisms. In response, the article then introduces deliberative mini-publics as a democratic innovation which, while of increasing significance in the public sphere, has been neglected in the university context. Drawing on empirical literature to account for universities' unique institutional realities, the article ultimately demonstrates mini-publics' potential to bolster deliberative capacity in university governance, both in terms of introducing deliberative inputs into decision-making and by cultivating the abilities and environment which support deliberative governance more generally. In all, by bringing together higher education and political scholarship, this work advances theory on student participation and university governance and offers novel directions for university practice.

Student voice has been heralded as a practice that provides all children with the opportunity to exercise their right to participate in matters affecting them. However, a common research concern is that not all student voices are consistently or comprehensively attended to. What is often under scrutinised is how this uneven distribution of opportunities that students have to voice may be felt by students, in particular by those who "have" the opportunity to voice. This paper examines a point of perplexity in data generated with members of student representative councils who participated in focus groups. These focus groups were conducted as part of a study that evaluated a primary school student voice programme facilitated by an external provider. We found that participants' feelings about the 'privilege' of being involved in student voice practice belied their assertions about student voice as a 'right' that all students have. Claire Hemmings' concept of affective dissonance is used to guide our thinking about this disparity between what students think and feel about voicing. We argue for the importance of attending to how students feel about voicing as how they feel may impact on their potential to act as agents of change.

Purpose: The overall aim of this article is to discuss the conditions and character of collective protest in schools. When do pupils as a collective gain the ability to express critical views on the policies of schools, and what is that criticism about? Using Sweden as an example, I discuss this question by studying the collective organisation of pupils from the 1920s to the 1980s. Design/methodology/approach: The article discusses and compares two phases of pupils' collective organisation in Sweden--one dominated by pupil councils, one by national organisations. The article discusses how pupil councils at individual schools arose in the wake of the 1928 grammar school charter, and illustrates its influence using a case study of a grammar school in Stockholm. Furthermore, the article investigates how national organisations, first formed in 1952, expressed their concerns about national school policies. Findings: The first phase (ca. 1928-1951) was dominated by the idea of discipline, and the main task of pupil councils was to help teachers in maintaining discipline. The second phase (ca. 1952-1989) was instead characterised by a heightened focus on protests and democracy. From then on, the main idea was that pupil councils and national pupil organisations should change the school, making it more suited to the needs of the pupils. Originality/value: There is much research on university students and student uprisings. However, much of the previous research on the student voice is related to the upheavals of the long 1968. By concentrating its efforts on a limited time period when protest was more obvious, previous research has arguably not been able to discuss transformations over time.

The lack of women in elected leadership roles trickles down to student governance at colleges and universities (American Student Government Association, 2016). The researcher sought to understand how women student leaders made meaning of their experiences as a leader and how their understanding influences their actions and motivations. Through the use of narrative inquiry, the researcher explored how participants defined and made meaning of their experiences as women student government association presidents. The data collected through a series of three interviews were then formed into individual narratives focusing on context and meaning-making for each participant. Our work resulted in rich data that was categorized into themes. The prevalent theme of a "chilly climate" was salient for each participant, which is discussed in this article. The article concludes with implications for student government advisors, as well as for future research on women student government association leaders.

This hermeneutic phenomenological study explores the lived experiences of eight openly gay undergraduate men involved in elected student government. While all of the men in this study identified with coming out, there were differences in their experiences with being out. As themes illuminated visibility, internalized homophobia, expectations of working harder than their peers, and a sentiment that they "just so happen to be gay," this study affirms the idea that there is not one single story of what it means to be gay or elected (or gay and elected).

Background: This study examined the association between participation in school-based and/or community-based activity and major depressive episodes (MDE) in adolescents using nationally representative data. Methods: This study utilized cross-sectional data from the National Survey of Drug Use and Health from 2015 to 2019. Nine screening questions determined the presence of past-year MDE in adolescents ages 12-17 (n = 67,033). Participants indicated past-year participation in school-based (eg, team sports, cheerleading, choir, band, student government, or clubs) and/or community-based activities (eg, volunteer activities, sports, clubs, or groups). Sociodemographic variables included sex, race/ethnicity, family income, and age. Descriptive statistics, univariable and multivariable regression analyses were conducted. The multivariable model included interaction terms between age and sex, and age and race/ethnicity. Results: Overall, 14% of the sample met the criteria for having MDE. The odds of MDE increased with age. Joint effects of age and sex, and age and race/ethnicity significantly influenced the association between MDE and school- or community-based activities. Participation in 1+ community-based activities was protective for MDE across all races/ethnicities. Conclusions: Findings help illuminate the direct association of school- and community-based activity participation on MDE risk in adolescents, improving our understanding of MDE across various sociodemographic subgroups in an adolescent population. Schools should aim to facilitate equitable programming and endorse adolescent participation in multiple activities throughout the year. Schools should examine the resources available and consider partnerships that would bolster resources, access, and social capital throughout the community.

This case study aimed to see what influence student government had in reducing behavioral write-ups, school violence and academic participation within a special high school. The study was conducted at a school located at a correctional facility among an all-male population between the ages of 16 to 17 years old. The school has been plagued with gang-related violence and behavioral referrals that have created a negative culture within the school. The study examined the possible relationship between participation in student government and the impact on the number of behavioral referrals and classroom participation among students. The results of the study demonstrated an overall reduction in behavioral referrals and increased student participation within the school during an increase of student population. Student government representatives created a behavior rubric that was adapted to all classrooms. Feuding gang violence dramatically lessened within the school after the adoption of the student government's behavior rubric.

This study examines the process of educational change as demonstrated in three elementary schools implementing education for sustainability (EfS). Actions and stages in the change process were characterized. Data included interviews with the school principals and teachers involved, in-school observations, and documentation (schools' vision statements, websites, and reports). Our findings indicate that important factors for a successful implementation include motives for change, persons involved, actions carried out, and follow-up activity. While all three schools showed evidence of changes implementing EfS as a regular part of the school's philosophy, only one school demonstrated changes deemed permanent and significant. This was the only school that implemented a gradual and structured process of change, that executed many actions at each stage, and where the principal and staff were well-qualified and fully committed. This study contributes to understanding how changes may be implemented in educational systems and emphasizes the importance of each stage.

Women have long held leadership roles in society and education, yet little attention has been given to the experiences of women student body presidents. We studied 20 women student body presidents at multiple four-year institutions to understand their experiences in student leadership. We found that these women felt extreme responsibility and pressure as president, focused on making positive changes for others and their campus communities, navigated complex gender expectations and environmental pressures, and gained significant confidence in their ability to lead. These findings suggest that given women's successes in elite leadership roles, institutions need to direct resources to encourage and develop women leaders among the student body, create more opportunities for women to hold leadership roles, and facilitate opportunities for engagement with other women already in leadership roles.

The appointment of student governors to the governing board is mandatory in further education (FE) colleges across the UK. There is, however, confusion and lack of clarity over the role of the student governor, and little empirical research, especially involving direct observation, has been undertaken which sheds light on this. This paper examines how the role of the student governor is understood by governing boards and how it is enacted in practice. Over one calendar year, we observed and video/audio-recorded governing board meetings in eight FE colleges across the UK, two in each UK country (England, Northern Ireland, Scotland, Wales). In addition, we interviewed key actors and spoke to student governors. Our findings reveal a lack of understanding about the role of the student governor which creates a tension between student governors acting in an advisory capacity as part of the governing body, and student governors representing learner voice. We conclude with recommendations for boards aimed at facilitating meaningful engagement of the student governor in governing processes.

Among other responsibilities, many college student governments (SGs) are responsible for overseeing student fees as part of their operation (Miles et al., 2008). In 2018 around 32% of SG presidents reported being very or extremely influential on decisions involving student life and student fees (Templeton et al., 2018). At some institutions, SGs oversee the allocation and dissemination of hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars. Being part of major institutional decisions, such as student fee allocations, can prepare undergraduate student leaders for post-college experiences, including interpreting tax systems, fundraising and budgeting, and even managing personal finances. Therefore, it is important to explore how involvement in college SG prepares students for life after college and, in the context of this study, work in post-college elected public office. This article illuminates the experiences of former SG leaders who ran for or served in elected public office between 2018 and 2021. Specifically, this study was guided by the question: What is the experience of former SG officers with post-college public office and the(ir) relationship(s) to fees or budgets?

Purpose: Lave and Wenger's Communities of Practice is presented as a conceptual framework for examining extracurricular activities as a part of democratic schools' contribution to students' civic engagement. Data from the IEA Civic Education Study is analyzed to investigate research questions on the association between participation in two civic communities of practice (student council and volunteer organizations) and two types of expected adult political participation as well as trust in political institutions in Australia and the United States. Method/approach: The methodology examined data from students in nationally representative samples of schools that surveyed 14-year-olds in 1999. This was the most recent large scale study of civic education in which these two countries participated. Analysis of variance examined main effects and statistical interactions, especially by gender. Findings: Findings were that in both countries, participation in the two civic communities of practice was associated with higher levels of trust in political institutions and greater expectations to become an informed voter and an active citizen. The results also suggest that male and female students in the United States experience these communities of practice in different ways. Practical advantages to encouraging democratic communities of practice are important to the experience of democracy at school.

This study is anchored upon salient factors such as the perceptions of the students and student leaders on the effectiveness of performance of the Student Government of North Luzon Philippines State College. Student leaders could be benefited by the study for they shall be provided with a massive insight of how the Student Government operates. Since they are prospective leaders of the college, they may be able to determine which programs and projects could provide a better impact to students' welfare. For the school administrators, personnel and faculty members, they shall be illuminated with the real scenario of how student leaders work for the welfare of their constituents. They shall get a deeper understanding of the situations prompted by the student leaders in the campus; thereby helping them in some aspects of their academic lives. For the students, this study would provide the needed information as to how effective the Student Government is in ushering programs and projects which redound to their welfare. Based on the foregoing findings, the following conclusions were formulated: The Student Government, as to some extent, is doing its role in the college in making the students aware of their political rights. It is just that they need to hold regular leadership training seminars so that the students, especially the student leaders, could adequately learn how to become more mature and effective leaders. It should play the role of a facilitator to the administration or to any other student organizations whenever necessary.

Discipline management plays a pivotal role in enhancing learners' academic achievement. The Children Government is a key component geared towards enhancing children rights and creating a conducive learning environment. However, the inclusion of children government in discipline management in primary schools has not been appreciated by primary school teachers and administrators. The teachers and school administrators view the learners as too young to engage in discipline management. The purpose of this study was to assess the influence of children government on learners discipline management in public primary schools in Nyandarua County, Kenya. The study adopted the descriptive research design. The study was guided by the Role Theory as advanced by Biddle which argued that human behaviour is guided by expectations held by individuals. The target population was 2517 comprising of 151 deputy head teachers and 1024 teachers, 1338 student government members and four education officials. The study applied Gay principle to arrive at a sample size of 103 teachers, 46 deputy head teachers, 108 student government members and four education officials. Purposive sampling was used to select the education officials. The study employed teachers' questionnaires, deputy head teacher's questionnaire and student government member's interview guide as the primary data collection instruments. An interview guide for education officials was also used. Data analysis involved quantitative and qualitative procedures using Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS, Ver 19) computer programme. Descriptive statistics such as mean and percentages were used to analyse data. The study established that school administrators do not use children government in discipline management of learners. The study concluded that schools lacked capacity to enhance the effectiveness of children government in discipline management in public schools. The study recommends that the school administration should entrust some discipline management to the members of children government in order to improve their relations and enhance effective utilization of the school body. The study provides education stakeholders as well as teachers with strategies for integration of student governance in discipline management in primary schools.

This paper attempts to analyze the educational work of Stanislav Shatskii which was aimed at the formation and development of pupil government. His first pedagogical experiments were carried out in the early twentieth century. He made a great contribution to the development of pedagogical theory and practice. The Russian educator Stanislav Shatskii paid a lot of attention to the formation of a children's team, the development of pupil government in the learning process. He organized educational and research work in experimental school-colonies. Its purposes, structure and functions were one-of-a-kind in the world. The educational model of Stanislav Shatskii can serve as a basic matrix for the specialized education of modern Russia, as it contains the grounds, means and mechanisms for the implementation of learning and educational strategies that meet the interests of society, mentality and social basis of the Russian people.

This article explores the use of student voice to contribute to improving schools. Through the gathering of perspectives and experiences of staff and students, it considers how the responses to requirements for both student voice and school improvement interrelate and identifies challenges to be addressed. The research was conducted in Norway because, with its long-standing engagement with children's well-being and rights expressed through its comprehensive framework of legislation and allocation of resources, it has arguably created ideal conditions for students to be involved in improving schools. Findings revealed some recognition of the centrality of student voice in the enactment of democracy in schools: students and teachers had positive perceptions of student voice, and school leaders were willing to incorporate student voice in school improvement processes. Current uses of student voice were, however, largely restricted to the operations of the student council for a range of reasons. The absence of alternative structures, time constraints and doubts about competence were reported, leading to student voice having little impact on school improvement, even in what might be considered 'perfect' conditions.

This paper documents the structure and operations of student governments in contemporary Chinese higher education and their effect on college students' political trust and party membership. We first investigate the structure and power distribution within student governments in Chinese universities, specifically focusing on the autonomy of student governments and the degree to which they represent students. Second, using a large sample of college students, we examine how participating in student government affects their political trust and party membership. Our results show that student government in Chinese higher education possesses a complex, hierarchical matrix structure with two main parallel systems--the student union and the Chinese Communist Party system. We found that power distribution within student governments is rather uneven, and student organisations that are affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party have an unequal share of power. In addition, we found that students' cadre experience is highly appreciated in student cadre elections, and being a student cadre significantly affects their political trust and party membership during college.

The objective of this study was to identify the various types of student councils based on their areas of interest. The study population included 100 school principals or deputy principals, in junior high schools or high schools, who filled in questionnaires to map student councils. The analysis yielded 89 student-council profiles, with two variables--community volunteering and student rights--forming the basis for the other variables, and thus for the four types derived: integrative, voluntary, rights, and dim. The 'Discussion' section describes an attempt to understand the uniqueness of these two variables and their interrelations.

The objective of this study is to describe the current status of the Saudi Childs' participation through Class and School Councils "AlShura Council" as a way of increasing child rights in participation at a school level and democracy at a national level. The central two questions that guide this research are: How are the class and School Councils "AlShura Council" organized and operated at Saudi schools in relation to student participation? and, what are the experiences of student participation through Class and School Councils "AlShura Council" from the perspective of students? As the study design was a qualitative one-case study, qualitative analysis is used to analyze the results. The results show that the establishment of Class and School Councils "AlShura Council" involves students in real decision-making processes. The students' voices are taken into consideration and that they are a part of decision-making processes at the school. Overall, the results seemed to suggest that by giving the children a chance of participation will benefit the students themselves, the school as a whole as well as the country in the work towards fulfilling the goal of increased democracy. Based on the results of this study, it is recommended that the prospects of initiating Class and School Councils "AlShura Council" at other schools in Saudi Arabia, as a way of increasing student participation, are both possible and achievable.

This paper analyses whether the gender-sensitive and democratically elected student councils helped in strengthening school leadership and providing a platform for increased awareness and advocacy for male and female students to address their needs and rights in primary and secondary schools in Tanzania. The data were collected through qualitative methodology using in-depth interviews with purposively selected 29 school heads, 35 mentor teachers, 24 champions and 54 student leaders. Other data were obtained from focus-group discussions with 590 student leaders. The findings show that the student council plays a major role in strengthening school leadership and increasing the ability of students, particularly girls, to voice their needs and concerns. Some students' needs and concerns were sexual harassment, the right to quality education and health services and the elimination of corporal punishment. The use of student councils helps to improve the delivery of quality education in schools.

Participating in activities such as being involved in school life and practicing leadership skills are as important for immigrant learners as studying English. We surveyed 33 student volunteers and analyzed testimonies of nine staff members to investigate how English as a second language (ESL) student volunteers' engagement and leadership development play a significant role in their integration into the larger community and contribute to students' full civic integration.

This article derives from a larger hermeneutic phenomenological study on openly gay undergraduate men in elected student government. Findings from this study include gay men engaging in the work of advocacy and re(-)presentation as part of their elected student government role(s). Gay men acting as advocates in this context were called on to stand up and "out" as leaders on their campuses. This included collecting and sharing stories of students facing marginalization and responding to campus issues and crises. Recommendations include making student government more representative and listening to and honoring the voices and experiences of student leaders and constituents.