Student representation

The purpose of student representation is to encourage student input into the continued improvement and development of the University's teaching programmes. Elected representatives canvas student opinion so that they can comment on their cohort's academic experience and put forward ideas for positive changes, including organisation and administration.

Tutors should encourage students to take on the role - it is in both the class and the teaching team's interests to have good representatives. Representatives themselves benefit from the opportunity to gain an insight into how the University works, to understand the concerns and constraints of teaching staff and others in the School and to develop skills that will stand them in good stead in the future.

The core of the role is to represent the views of the class to the teaching team who deliver the programme, but it goes beyond this to School and institution level. This means it is important for representatives to be properly elected and registered and for them to receive training and support throughout the year. Tutors need to make sure their representatives are elected in time to register and attend training sessions.

Who co-ordinates the student representation programme?

Quality and Curriculum Services (QCS) and the Students' Union co-ordinate the registration of course representatives and their training programme. QCS will send details of procedures and deadlines for conducting elections to programme leaders before the start of the autumn term.

Programme leaders are responsible for ensuring that course representatives are elected, for informing elected representatives how to register and find out about training, and for forwarding names and student ID numbers of elected representatives to the Student Administration Team.

Electing a student representative

Every class should elect at least one course representative at the beginning of each academic year. This includes undergraduate and postgraduate students, and those studying at partner institutions as well as those at the University.

Election is for one year only. If a student would like to continue as the class representative for a second or third year, they can stand for election again, but should not take their re-election for granted.

Up to four current students can also become members of the Student Experience Committee. These are not necessarily students who are or have been course representatives, but this is another opportunity for those who are interested in getting more involved.

The student representative's role

Although the role of the student representative is concerned in the main with academic interests, it goes beyond this to School and institutional level. Interactions can include the following:

• Class level - Meeting the programme leader and other teaching staff
• Programme level - Attendance at Boards of Study (programme level)
• School level - Feeding into the School Quality Standards and Enhancement Committee (QSEC) - either by attending a pre-QSEC forum or contributing to a QSEC discussion site to raise awareness of issues that may affect students on programmes across the School. Some representatives will attend QSEC. This can be as an elected QSEC representative or as a volunteer to bring forward issues raised through the forums. Different Schools do this in different ways.
• Institutional level - All representatives are invited to a Registrar's forum once or twice a year. They can give feedback on course matters at these meetings, but the main aim is to raise issues that may not be captured elsewhere, including, for example, induction week, information from the Framework Office, facilities, transport, catering, etc.
• All representatives will be invited to take part in meetings arranged by the Students' Union. This in turn informs the Students' Union officers who represent the student body on Senate committees.

For more information about student representation, please contact Vivien Houghton.