Study of the Power of Chinese First Class University’s Students to Participate in University Governance: Take "X" University for example

• In Event: University governance through a comparative lens

Proposal

In recent years, improving the university governance system has become an important breakthrough for the high-quality development of universities. In the context of China's double first-class construction, the subjectivity of students is receiving increasing attention, and "student-centered" has become one of the direction indicators of university governance. As one of the stakeholders, students should have the right to participate in university governance. Henry Rosovsky divided stakeholders in universities into four levels, with students falling under the category of the first level, emphasizing the importance of "participation" in student university governance. With the development of social democratization and rule of law, the demand for students to participate in university affairs management is becoming increasingly strong. The process of improving the university governance system cannot ignore the call for students to participate in power.However, even if the status of students has shifted from object to subject, the manifestation of subject identity often remains in the various services provided by the school and the teacher-student relationship in teaching. Students enjoy the management and services provided by the school like "babies". From the perspective of university governance, this approach ignores the subjective consciousness of college students, as they do not participate in the specific affairs and management of the school, and their participation power is minimal. Student power is an indispensable component of the university governance system and power structure, and currently student power is still in a weak position in university governance. As a special group of students with mature minds and the ability to achieve self-management, college students have increasingly prominent demands for democratic autonomy and participation in school governance within the school. As core stakeholders of the school, students' right to participate in school affairs should be given attention. Through a review of existing literature and theories, it has been found that the current organizational forms of student participation in university governance mainly include student organization participation, student representative participation, and individual student participation. The modes of participation mainly include regulatory participation, guiding participation, contractual participation, and voluntary participation. The scope of participation in university governance roughly includes three aspects: school management, teaching management, and logistics management. In existing research, more attention has been paid to the performance of student group power in university governance, such as the role of organizational forms such as student congresses and student unions in school management. There has been less research on the power of individuals to participate in school management, which is the innovation of this study.The study adopts a qualitative research method and through in-depth interviews and analysis with students, counselors, and managers of chinese first class university represented by "X" University, it is found that the "X" University management environment and system provide a "space" for students to participate in school management power; Students have a strong sense of democracy and can effectively use their power to participate in school management, but this participation power is within a certain "limit"; The power of student participation conflicts with the authority of the school and requires compromise between both parties to achieve a "balance". This study discussed the research findings and concluded that to ensure students' participation in university governance, it is necessary to optimize the school management system and legalize students' participation in power; Balancing the relationships between various stakeholders and rationalizing students' participation in power; Form the concept of joint governance of the school and standardize the power of college students.The essence of university governance is the process in which university managers coordinate and arrange scientific and reasonable institutional arrangements among various stakeholders, in order to optimize the structure of education and improve its efficiency.

Author

• Shifei Duan, College of Education,Zhejiang University