Unpacking the Paradox of Student-Involvement Quality Promotion Nexus: Knowing Where to Draw the Line and Implications Thereof

Abstract

Student-involvement in higher-education is necessary for quality-assurance outcomes, yet such involvement also threatens attainment of quality assured, presenting the paradox of higher-education (HE) systems. With the massification of enrolment-figures across the HE sector has been the need to balance HEI and student-centred perspectives. The notion of students as co-producers, consumers, and products of HEI processes creates discord in the quality assurance arena. Contradictory problems manifest when the producer must satisfy the consumer and audit quality of the products, yet students are all of these. This article explored the extent to which student-involvement fosters quality as well as sets parameters beyond which such participation cannot be done without compromising quality-assurance and desired academic-success. The artile drew a line for student-involvement and quality- assurance as double-barreled and sometimes paradoxical, contradictory pursuits. Data elicited from two HEIs in Zimbabwe using the questionnaire method and analysed using Microsoft Excel package generated descriptive frequencies and related graphs and charts to present findings. Documents were analysed using thematic content analysis to glean for relevant secondary data. Student-involvement is marred by unclear parameters at the three confluences of ‘students as co-producers’; ‘students as consumers’; and ‘students as products’ of HEI quality-assurance processes students should participate in, consume, and be products of. Derolling is thus necessary for students to function in various capacities as as co-producers, consumers, or as products. Students as ‘co-producers’ cannot be expected to produce themselves through ‘students as products’, neither can they be ‘consumers’ themselves while being the ‘product’ to be consumed by industry and communities through employment and innovation. The National Assembly should address contradictions through amending HEI-establishing Acts to cede policy making powers to the University Councilsacting jointly with senior management of universities. As co-producers, students involvement should be unlimited at governance levels (by different HEI students) while as consumers (within particular HEIs), student involvement should be limited to lower rungs at consumer level to avoid contradictions that potentially compromise quality. As HEI products, students should be limited to Alumni activities as main function should clearly differentiate among the various roles when crafting HEI policies that foster student involvement.