Students as partners: Capitalizing on student active involvement to inform and enhance institutional teaching and learning

Attendees are encouraged to participate in a brief survey to help the facilitators better prepare.

The session will encourage participants to explore and reflect on the value of active student engagement in designing and enhancing teaching and learning experiences at the course, department and institution levels. Student involvement may range from providing insights that inform and guide instructional directions all the way to active collaboration on creating different elements of the teaching and learning experiences.

Including students as primary stakeholders in discussions around teaching and learning contributes to the creation of robust and engaging educational experiences. Structured collaboration of students, instructors, teaching assistants and instructional designers helps bridge gaps in these different groups’ perceptions and expectations. This provides an opportunity for parties representing the different roles in the teaching and learning process to work together to tackle problems and design creative solutions. These activities also have the desirable outcome of empathy building by factoring each group’s goals and challenges into a synergetic design.

Session activities and discussions will invite participants to identify relevant criteria to consider when planning for co-design exercises, taking into account their own institutional and course-level opportunities and challenges.

Facilitators will discuss examples of including students in designing experiences and crafting solutions around various pedagogical elements that affect learning and teaching. Sample projects involving partnership with students at the American University in Cairo addressed topics such as academic integrity, student engagement, enhancement of program structure and outcomes, and creation of more engaging, effective and participatory learning spaces.