Engaging Students as Participants and Partners: An Argument for Partnership with Students in Higher Education Research on Student Success

Abstract

Student success is of the upmost importance across the global higher education sector with a wealth of rich scholarship demonstrating the complexity of influences and factors that shape success. This article acknowledges that complexity and focuses on how students perceive, and partner in, shaping notions of their learning success through an analysis of two in-depth case studies. I draw on the theoretical framework of students as partners in learning and teaching. Broader implications are articulated followed by a specific focus on cross-cultural partnership from the perspective of a Chinese student partner. I argue that higher education scholars researching student success and learning outcomes should take seriously the perceptions of students to inform practice and policy, while also partnering with students in our own research to more genuinely comprehend the complexities of student success.