Student representation has been conceptualised and studied in different ways and by different researchers for more than 10 years. However, there are too few meta-narrative reviews indicating the main developments that have taken place in student representative councils (SRCs). Against this background, this article offers a summary of the events…

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…

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…

The "Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions" (BDS) movement against Israel is one of the faces of anti-Semitism in the United States. It threatens not only Jewish students and scholars but also the political neutrality of the university. The BDS movement is particularly concentrated in higher education and creates an environment of academic…

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…

This chapter explores how two student activists used their roles as student body presidents to lead their campuses to protest the Kent State Shootings in 1970. The administrative responses and their strategies for working with activists are also explored.

In recent years in the United States, women have been outpacing men on important college outcomes such as grade point average and degree attainment. While women have made strides in the last few decades, there are still important areas of higher education in which women are significantly underrepresented. In student government, women are vastly…

Building democracies in K-8 schools is a promising approach to increasing young people and educators' civic knowledge, skills and dispositions. The Rendell Center for Civics and Civics Engagement leveraged strategies and concepts from the fields of civic education, student voice, and distributed leadership to build a youth-adult school governance…

Building active and informed citizens is a major part of civics and citizenship education in order to enhance and sustain democracies. Civic learning and civic action opportunities within school contexts are commonly claimed to promote an active and informed citizenry. In the present research, we examine the meaning of formal civics education and…

On 26 and 27 September 2014, 43 students from the "Profesor Isidro Burgos" Rural Normal School in Ayotzinapa, Guerrero, Mexico, disappeared, and six people died. In this article, I analyse the event as the result of long-term historical processes, from the perspective of the social mobilisation that caused the students' disappearance on…

Students, if organised into representative student governments or movements, can be a highly influential agency shaping higher education policy. This article introduces the Special Issue on student power in a global perspective, which addresses the question of how students are organised in different world regions and what role they play in higher…

Student representation in Poland has a relatively short but turbulent history. This article offers an historical appraisal of the development of student representation at the national level in the context of rapid and deep structural changes in Polish higher education. Based on a desktop analysis of official documentation, legislation, ideological…

The transition from one-party rule and other forms of authoritarianism to multiparty democracy in the 1990s has had a profound impact on the organisation and role of student politics in Africa. Against the background of student involvement in African politics in the twentieth century, leading up to student participation in Africa's "second…

The purpose of this historical case study dissertation is to discover the story of Dr. Katharine Rea in her role as dean of women and later faculty member in the higher education and student personnel program at the University of Mississippi. As the dean of women in the 1960s Rea was responsible for the well-being and quality of the educational…

Studies have found that prior involvement in student politics while in school seems to be a good predictor of adult political engagement. While most studies of adults have obtained retrospective data on participation in school elections, there have been few studies of students about this activity. We contribute to this latter relatively unexplored…